Sick of Microsoft and Google? This new European office suite is a private, open-source alternative

Office EU has officially launched in The Hague, positioning itself as a fully European, open-source alternative to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace. The service is built primarily on Nextcloud Hub and bundles file storage, email, calendar, online document editing, and chat/video calls into a single browser-based platform. CEO Maarten Roelfs emphasizes the platform addresses Europe's dependency on American software, stating it offers "sovereignty, privacy, and transparency at its core." The launch comes as several European governments and agencies, including France, Austria, and Denmark, are actively moving away from US-based cloud services.

The service operates entirely on EU-based infrastructure and data centers, ensuring customer data remains under European jurisdiction and insulated from foreign legal regimes. Office EU supports common Microsoft Office formats (DOCX, XLSX, PPTX) and standard protocols like IMAP and CalDAV to ease migration, though specific migration tools haven't been detailed. It provides desktop sync clients for Windows, macOS, and Linux, plus mobile apps. While not matching Microsoft 365's full feature set, Office EU targets organizations prioritizing European data sovereignty, transparency, and reduced complexity over dependency on external platforms.