Talk about diagramming tools, and one of the first names that pop into your head is Microsoft Visio. With a plethora of templates, shapes, layouts, and designs, Visio is a paradise for your visual modeling requirements.
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However, unless you are working in an MNC or a part of a massive team, the price tag of $280 for Standard version or as low as $5 per user monthly might make it a bit costlier for folks on a tight budget.
Oct 05, 2019 It is an open-source software and is a truly cross-platform app. You can either use it as a simple web app or you can download native apps for macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, and even Chrome OS. The software is very capable for personal use and even supports real-time collaboration between multiple users.
So, if you are seeking free alternatives to Microsoft Visio, don't worry, we have got you sorted. The following list of diagramming software and tools will help you choose the right one.
- Talk about diagramming tools, and one of the first names that pop into your head is Microsoft Visio. With a plethora of templates, shapes, layouts, and designs, Visio is a paradise for your visual.
- Open Source Microsoft Office Visio Alternatives As Visio is Microsoft's commercial solution for professional diagramming and workflow drafting, it has many alternatives just like other parts of the Microsoft Office Suite.
- 2020-4-2 yED is a free open source Visio alternative for Windows, Linux, Mac, and BSD. It is a dedicated diagram making software in which you can create UML Diagrams, Flowcharts, Entity Relationship Diagrams, Network Diagrams, and more types of diagrams. For some popular diagram types, it provides dedicated sections containing diagram elements of those diagrams.
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Read More1. Lucidchart
Lucidchart advertises itself as a Visio alternative and boasts of being used by the teams at Cisco, Harvard University, Accenture, and more. From floor plans to Android mockups, it has a ton of robust pre-made templates.
Apart from that, this online tool is extremely easy to use. It allows you to add different shapes, containers, and smart connectors to make visually appealing designs. Plus, the shapes and containers change as per the type of diagram. On top of that, there are a slew of shapes and layering options to choose from.
The free version of Lucidchart is limited to three active documents per user. If you are mainly looking for personal use, the free templates and shapes should be sufficient. However, if you are not satisfied, you can upgrade to any of the paid versions.
The basic paid plan of Lucidchart is priced at $4 per month and it lets you use unlimited shapes and documents. Meanwhile, the Pro user plan is priced at $10 per month with the option to import or export Visio files. If you have a small team that often collaborates on designs, the Pro plan for teams is a bit heftily priced at $20 per month.
Why Lucidchart
- Ridiculously easy to learn and use
- Huge library of templates and shapes
- Drag and drop
- Integrations
2. Creately
Creately is another powerful online tool hiding many templates behind a simple interface. Available across multiple platforms, Creately believes in keeping things simple. It has an intuitive interface with a bunch of free templates and shapes. Unlike Lucidchart, this tool supports a variety of 'fun' templates that you can use to make community banners or for your school projects.
Unlike LucidCraft, this tool supports a variety of 'fun' templates.
Other than that, there's a tiny contextual toolbar that shows up as soon as you select an object. With tools like quick connectors, text box creation, and external links, it makes the process faster and quicker.
On the collaboration front, you can work with your team members just by adding their email IDs. The free version lets you add up to three collaborators. Quite naturally, this restriction is removable if you upgrade to the paid versions.
Like any other diagramming tool, Creately limits some of the features like Visio files import and SVG export in the free plan. The personal plan starts at $5 per month and goes up to $125 for team plans.
Why Creately
- Tons of templates
- One-click contextual toolbar
- Ready-made color palettes
- Let's you import images from the web
3. Pencil Project
The beauty of Pencil Project lies in the fact that it's free desktop software. For an open source project, Pencil has a pretty clean interface with all the necessary tools. It allows you to create mockups for almost everything — mobiles, web pages, and even conventional flowcharts and diagrams.
The controls are quite straightforward. Double click to rotate the elements and single click to resize them. If I were to compare it to the above tools, I'd say that the icons may not be as sharp or colorful. However, those are some of the trade-offs if you are looking for a completely free diagramming tool.
As far as the templates are concerned, the options are limited to creating wireframes, GUI, and flowcharts. You won't find any fancy templates for infographics, family tree or network diagram. Export options include SVG, ODT, PDF, PNG or standard web page.
Why Pencil Project
- Free and standalone software
- Clean interface with simple tools
- Cool collection of mobile GUI elements for smartphone mockups
4. Draw.io
Draw.io is an utter delight of a diagramming tool. From standard charts and flowcharts to entity relationship diagrams and UML diagrams, you can play with a lot of templates in this online tool.
The best thing is that you don't even need to register. Simply open the site, select the templates and start working. Draw.io also lets you connect to Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive and even Github to export your templates. Similar to Pencil Project, you can export your projects in PNG, SVG, PDF, XML, and a few other formats. Plus, it also supports embedded URLs.
Draw.io redefines simplicity as it's incredibly easy to use. All you have to do is click on an element and all the necessary formatting options like font, color, style are accessible through the menu on the right.
Also, the collection of shapes and objects are sufficient for a free version.
Why Draw.io
- Super simple interface
- Has the option to search for shapes
- Good for small-scale work
5. yEd Graph Editor
yEd Graph Editor might not be the most stylish Visio alternative, but trust me when I say that it has the right tools and elements to make your work seamless and easy.
Since it's also a desktop software, you won't find many ready-made templates. But let me tell you that it is by far one of the best free tools for creating charts, flowcharts, and diagrams of computer networks. Plus, working on this tool is relatively easy. Simply drag and drop the elements.
As for the export options, yEd allows you to save your diagrams in PDF, JPEG, PNG, SWF, and HTML formats.
Why yEd Graph Editor
- Apt for flowcharts and network diagrams
- Plenty of shapes, edge types, entity relation elements, etc.
6. XMind
If your diagrams involve more of mapping, then you should give XMind a try. The beauty of XMind is that you can create an entire visually appealing mind map just through keystrokes. Yes, you read that right.
This offline drawing tool supports a few handy keyboard shortcuts that let you create child elements, add text or skip to the next element.
The elements and shapes library is immense and is available on a click of a button, along with the formatting options like font, structure, color, etc.
XMind is the a open source project and hence free to use. My only gripe is that the trial version stamps the XMind watermark on the diagrams. And to remove that, you need to subscribe to the Zen version by paying $27.99 per six months.
Why XMind?
- Great for mappings
- Vast library of elements and shapes
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Click here to see our office 365 articles page7. Gliffy
Gliffy is another good online alternative to Microsoft Visio. Gliffy has three different account options to choose from — Basic (Standard), Single, and Team account. The Single and Team account are paid versions while the Basic is free to use. Here, the catch is that all your diagrams are marked public. So, unless you are planning to make a>Go to Gliffy
8. Google Drawings
Last but not the least, we have Google Drawings. Like most of the Google apps and tools, we have the G-advantage here — it's free and it's relatively simple to use.
And unlike the free versions (of paid drawing apps) that limit shapes and templates, Google Drawings offers loads of features and options.
You can play with process diagrams or try your hand at relationship diagrams. The color schemes are customizable. Plus, you can also change the levels or areas of the diagrams as per your needs. Given that Google documents can be easily shared, collaboration is surprisingly easy on Drawings.
Why Google Drawings
- Free and simple to use
- Plenty of templates to choose from
- Customizable colors and areas
- Gets automatically saved
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Read MoreMake Powerful Visualizations
They say that seeing is believing and rightly so. Be it a software process or a simple infographic, unless the data is visually appealing and easy to understand, the work one puts in such diagrams may go to waste. And at the same time, it should be easy for a user to make such diagrams without much hassles.
So, these were some of the free alternatives to Microsoft Visio. There are also some other programs like DIA, Open Office, and LibreOffice which you can try.
Read NextOffice 365 vs Open365: Can Open Source Finally Win You OverAlso See#Online tools for diagrams #flowchartsDid You Know
It's estimated that people share more than 700 billion photos per year on Facebook.
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Today, we are announcing the general availability of Office 2019 for Windows and Mac. Office 2019 is the next on-premises version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Project, Visio, Access, and Publisher.
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Office 365 ProPlus is the most productive and most secure Office experience for enterprises.
Learn moreOffice 365 ProPlus, the cloud-connected version of Office, delivers the most productive and most secure Office experience—with the lowest total cost of ownership for deployment and management. However, for customers who aren’t ready for the cloud, Office 2019 provides new features and updates to the on-premises apps for both users and IT professionals. Like Windows Long Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) releases, Office 2019 provides a set of valuable enhancements for customers who can’t be cloud-connected or receive regular updates.
The new enhancements in Office 2019 are a subset of a long list of features that have been added to Office 365 ProPlus over the last three years. Office 2019 is a one-time release and won’t receive future feature updates. However, we’ll continue to add new features to Office 365 ProPlus monthly, including innovations in collaboration, artificial intelligence (AI), security, and more.
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Office 2019 delivers features across apps to help users create amazing content in less time. In PowerPoint 2019, you can create cinematic presentations with new features like Morph and Zoom. And improved inking features across the apps in Windows—like the roaming pencil case, pressure sensitivity, and tilt effects—allow you to naturally create documents.
Excel 2019 adds powerful new data analysis features, including new formulas and charts and enhancements to PowerPivot.
Word 2019 and Outlook 2019 help you focus on what matters most. Learning Tools, like Read Aloud and Text Spacing, make it easier to engage with your content. Focus Mode blocks out distractions and puts your content front and center. And Focused Inbox moves less important emails out of the way—so you can get straight to taking care of business. For a longer list of the new features in Office 2019, see our FAQs.
Office 2019 also includes new IT value for enhanced security and streamlined administration. We introduced Click-to-Run (C2R), a modern deployment technology, in Office 2013, and it’s now used to deploy and update Office across hundreds of millions of devices worldwide. With Office 2019, we’re moving the on-premises versions of Office to C2R to reduce costs and improve security. The advantages of C2R include predictable monthly security updates, up-to-date apps on installation, reduced network consumption through Windows 10 download optimization technology, and an easy upgrade path to Office 365 ProPlus. C2R offers the same enterprise-focused management capabilities as Microsoft Installer (MSI) based products and will also support an in-place upgrade when you move to Office 2019 from older MSI-based products. To learn more, refer to the Office 2019 Click-to-Run FAQ.
The 2019 release of Office products also includes updates to our servers, and in the coming weeks, we will release Exchange Server 2019, Skype for Business Server 2019, SharePoint Server 2019, and Project Server 2019.
Office 2019 is a valuable update for customers who aren’t yet ready for the cloud. And each time we release a new on-premises version of Office, customers ask us if this will be our last. We’re pleased to confirm that we’re committed to another on-premises release in the future. While the cloud offers real benefits in productivity, security, and total cost of ownership, we recognize that each customer is at a different point in their adoption of cloud services. We see the on-premises version of Office as an important part of our commitment to give customers the flexibility they need to move to the cloud at their own pace.
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- Commercial volume-licensed (trusted) customers can access Office 2019 starting today.
- Office 2019 is now available for consumer and commercial customers. For consumer customers in China, India, and Japan, Office 2019 suites will be available in the next few months.
- Certain features are only available in the Mac or Windows versions of Office 2019. For details, see the FAQ.