This seems hard to believe, but it appears to be genuine…,
Isn’t “lifetime” just misleading marketing here?
It seems to be a license for the stand-alone version of Office, version 2021 (and no future versions?!).
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Not if you can use that version of the software for a lifetime. Lifetime in this case being that at some time it probably will not work anymore because of OS updates.
If you expect updates to newer, major, versions you will not have those, for that you need to either buy the new version when it’s released or buy a subscription license.
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Lifetime — Lifetime of the user
Lifetime of the Version — Lifetime of the software version or product till it’s no more supported by the vendor or the OS. Software is not a living being. Either it’s supported or not supported. It’s running or not running. I have never heard anyone saying the software is going to die in next 20 mins. But its always said the software is supported for next 2 years and some cases you can even get support even long after it’s being tagged as non supported. Hmm is it dead or in coma 
It’s such a bad marketing strategy and I think one day some one will sue them or any vendor for false usage of Lifetime.
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I agree it is bad marketing practice to use “Lifetime”.
You buy a license which allows you to use a certain version of that software, it does not say anything about how long the software will work. You do not buy the software, but only a license to use it. So in practice if for any reason the software stops working you still have te license, but no software available 
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True. But that’s where the support comes into play. The software cannot run on its whole. It needs an Operating System and/or 3rd party software to run on. So while you buy the license to run, it can stop working due to an OS update or 3rd party dependencies. So even though you have the license, the software won’t work. That’s where the vendor says till what time they will support the version.
For enterprise customers some software products do get much longer support than the standard support cycle.
So yes you are given a license and also a timeline till when it’s supported. After the timeline is passed you can still use the software as long as it runs in non supported form.
Subscriptions are a different game altogether where in you pay for timeline only .
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IMO yes. It appears that this is a 3rd party close out sale because Microsoft still shows $249 on their website. As does Apple.
I seem to be the odd one who isn’t bothered by it.
Buy it today and install it on a machine with any modern OS. It will work. As long as you stay on that machine/OS combo it will never stop working and you will never have to pay another dime for it. (We also know that it will continue to work - for a lifetime - on machines that do have their OS upgraded, at least to a certain point.)
If subscriptions come with a monthly (or annual) license, what should we call the license that doesn’t expire? They used to use “perpetual,” which doesn’t seem any different from “lifetime” to me.
As is covered thoroughly in the subscriptions threads - developers are kind of in a no win with users now. We don’t want things to go subscription, but we want software to work forever, no matter what changes we make to our system. Suppose I bought a camper top with a lifetime warranty for my Ford truck. Five years later I trade it in and get a Toyota truck, or even a newer model Ford with a slightly different body style, and the camper top won’t work with it. I wouldn’t blame the camper top maker or say his marketing was misleading. my speculation is that because, to us, software is just bits, we think of it quite differently than other products?
Well that was a lot of words just to say, “Eh, it’s fine with me.” 
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I believe this is what we used to call “buying software.”
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These 11 words > my 250 words.
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Well said. Long gone art.
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I’m happy to use the old “buying software” model; especially at this price. By the time it stops being supported I will have gotten any potential monthly subscription cost for it many times over.
The issue is that more and more third party software which integrates with Office requires Office 365. For example, my employer’s VoIP phone service provides an Outlook add-on which could sync our Outlook contacts to our softphone and/or desk phones. But it only works with an Office 365 Subscription, not with a standalone Office license. My employer still purchases standalone Office licenses, so we can’t use the add-on. So while I could make my desk phone dial a number simply by clicking a button on Outlook, instead I find myself either manually entering the number (with potential mistakes) or copy/pasting the number into the softphone. Sure I have many commonly used numbers in the phone’s contacts list, but then when numbers change I need to update the number in two places.
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I sort of hate what the average consumer will think this license means phrased as lifetime but I get why it’s referred this way. With the subscription-fication of software the past couple of years I can understand it. Yes you may lose developer and OS support but nothing is stopping you from using the software where as the second I stop paying O365 the suite of apps don’t work.
I still use 2016 on my personal machine and my wife is on an even earlier version on hers. Part of the reason we’ve never wanted to upgrade is its fine for our needs and still works.
Funny thread. It used to be normal to be stuck on version 2007 of Office for years, and you knew you’d probably have to upgrade it before you died. 
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I agree. I have windows software from the 90’s that still runs, and I have much newer Mac software that doesn’t.
I feel for a 1 user license it seems fair priced. If you can use it this way it is ok. My feeling is that Microsoft is dragging you more and more into the ecosystem and with software and data available on every device all of the time having the ability to use it on one machine. I had the same voice ist rear and I switched to a discounted 0365 subscription just to habe it on multiple machines and in the web and on my iPad. If the Pappel tools are good enough for you and you need office only now then a single license is ok. If you need it on multiple or devices a discounted O365 is not really higher priced. Especially as you can stack multiple discounted 1 year licenses to have a long running discounted price.
I know what you mean about nice new features coming, but Office '21 will receive about six more years of support from Microsoft. During the majority of that time, feature enhancements are part of that and then the last couple years there will still be fixes so it runs on latest macOS etc.
Previous versions were like this too–e.g. Office '11 only broke on Catalina.
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Single Mac license for $50 sounds pretty good for someone who needs it. Wondering if this same license will allow the iOS version to activate???
For $49 it’s worth it.