We always recommend only having one version of Office on a machine and we recommend you use our most current versions. Having said that, there are times that due to adoption, testing, budget or migration strategies, it becomes necessary to have multiple versions of Office on a machine. There are certain combinations that are supported and others that are not.
First, there are now two architectures of Office builds. Volume Licensing (MSI) and Office click-to-run (Office 365) There are also three main Office products that we will look at here. Office Professional Plus, Visio and Project. Also, for the purpose of this article, installing one application like Skype for Business for example is the same as installing the entire Office suite. I will walk through some supported and unsupported scenarios here:
Unsupported:
Any MSI product(s) alongside the same year’s Click-to-run product(s) Example – Office ProPlus 2013 click-to-run and Visio 2013 MSI
Any Office 2013 Click-to-run product(s) alongside any 2016 click-to-run product(s).
Any Office 2016 click-to-run product alongside 2016 MSI language packs. (*note- you can have Office 2013 click-to-run and 2013 MSI language packs but they are not recommended. There are some known issues with this configuration)
Supported: (but not recommended)
Office ProPlus 2016 click-to-run and any 2013, 2010, or 2007 MSI product (ProPlus, Visio, Project)
Office ProPlus 2013 click-to-run and any 2016, 2010 or 2007 MSI product (ProPlus, Visio, Project)
Any combination of Office 2007, 2010, 2013 and 2016 MSI products (*note – you can only have one version of Outlook running at one time)
Keep in mind that there is a reason that we will say “supported but not recommended.” Issues with SharePoint Integration, Interop keys and other issues have been reported, as well as potentially new issues can occur when you use multiple versions of Office. So again, we recommend always being on the latest and greatest builds.
Additional resources:
Office installed using Click-to-Run and Window Installer on same computer isn't supported:
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Office-installed-using-Click-to-Run-and-Window-Installer-on-same-computer-isn-t-supported-30775ef4-fa77-4f47-98fb-c5826a6926cd?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US
Install and use different versions of Office on the same PC:
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Install-and-use-different-versions-of-Office-on-the-same-PC-6EBB44CE-18A3-43F9-A187-B78C513788BF