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Excel 2016 has had several releases with performance enhancements since the version we use at my company.

We're quite sensitive to Excel performance, and I'd really like to test out these versions, but the company volume license doesn't include these updates, and my personal Office 365 license just gives me Excel 2019.

How can I obtain an installer for this specific version of Excel 2016?

MarkNS
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    What kind of license do you have? Is it for Office 365 or Office 2016 via volume license (or something else?) – I say Reinstate Monica Jul 29 '19 at 16:01
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    @TwistyImpersonator - They are using a perpetual license more than likely. What isn't clear is if that license is a retail perpetual license or a volume perpetual license (updates are handled differently). However, the only mention of Office 365 is with the author's personal account, but they believe they are installing Office 2019 (which while true isn't the entire story) since Offce 2019 itself is based on Office 365 (not the other way around). – Ramhound Jul 29 '19 at 16:31

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How can I obtain an installer for this specific version of Excel 2016?

The feature set for perpetual Office 2016 and Office 2019 installations are actually static. To my knowlege Click-to-Run (C2R) Office 2016 and Office 2019 installations only receive security updates.

Source:

Based on the Excel update version history this feature was released on September 27 (10827.20138). Since Office 2019 is based on the 1809 Office 365 update, it means Office 2019, does indeed have this Excel feature.

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Source: How to update Office 2016 to Office 2019?

Source: Install Office updates

my personal Office 365 license just gives me Excel 2019.

Office 2019 is actually based on a specific Office 365 build which was released before the Office 2019 release date. This means you actually have Office 2019 installed, just with additional features, that were released after Office 2019 was released. Likewise, when the next version of Office is installed, it will have those features added to it's baseline. This same development cycle was also true for Office 2016.

How can I obtain an installer for this specific version of Excel 2016?

The Excel performances only exist with Office 2019 C2R or Office 365 installations

Community
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Ramhound
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  • Thanks for all the info @Ramhound. You're absolutely right about only receiving security updates with the volume license. The installation is up to date according to the license terms, so I guess we need to buy a new volume license to get the performance enhancements? What I find unclear is: how/where can we buy this license? It's not exactly clear (to me!) on the MS website. – MarkNS Jul 29 '19 at 18:42
  • Hmm, I think I'm starting to understand... you're saying that even if we bought a new license for Office 2016, it still wouldn't have the performance updates? I have to say, it seems pretty insane to me! I guess I will experiment with downgrading O365 using the technique described here: https://superuser.com/a/1381280/917765. – MarkNS Jul 29 '19 at 18:56
  • @MarkNS - how does one “downgrade” to Office 365 when Office 365 is the current version of Office? I am indeed saying that I f the current version of Office 2016 does NOT have the performance increase then Office 2016 nor Office 2019 would have it. This means your corporation would have to use Office 365 instead. The linked answer is only applicable to Office 365. – Ramhound Jul 29 '19 at 19:40
  • Yes, I understand. I will experiment with downgrading my personal Office 365 installation to a version which "contains" Excel 2016 (forgive me if I'm using the wrong terminology here). – MarkNS Jul 29 '19 at 20:09
  • I'm am confused however when you say "Office 2016 *nor* Office 2019 would have it."... If 2016 doesn't have the perf features because it's only security updates from a baseline, why should that mean those features are not in 2019? – MarkNS Jul 29 '19 at 20:13
  • @MarkNS - [It appears my past self proved my current self wrong.](https://superuser.com/questions/1366095/how-to-update-office-2016-to-office-2019/1366106#1366106). If you want the performance boost feature you can either subscribe to Office 365 or upgrade to a perpetual Office 2019 C2R installation. **There is absolutely no way to get the performance increases with Office 2016** Microsoft does not list all the updates to the Retail Office 2019, which means my screenshot from a similar question, is the only way to document the fact Office 2019 is Office 365 1809. – Ramhound Jul 29 '19 at 22:37