News

Upcoming SP3 for Office 2007, SharePoint 2007 'Likely Final'

Microsoft announced this week that Service Pack 3 for Office 2007 and SharePoint 2007, expected by year's end or sooner, will be "likely final" for both products.

A Thursday blog post from the Office Sustained Engineering and Release team said Microsoft expects to release SP3 "within Calendar Q4 2011," but later indicated it could be available as early as sometime this month: "The October 2011 release provides a 6-month window to test and deploy the release prior to exiting mainstream support."

In keeping with Microsoft's lifecycle support policy, Office 2007 and SharePoint 2007 are both scheduled to lose "mainstream support" on April 2012, five years after their initial release. Mainstream support gives users access to free support as well as security and non-security updates.

After losing mainstream support, the products will enter an "extended support" period for another five years, ending April 2017. Products in extended support will continue to receive security updates, but non-security updates will require organizations to enter a paid contract with Microsoft.

"Service Pack 3 contains a roll-up of all 2007 Cumulative and Public Updates since Service Pack 2 for both Office client suites and applications as well as SharePoint Servers, in addition to some new fixes for issues discovered during the lifecycle of SP2," the blog said.

SP3 will follow Microsoft's standard procedure for releasing service packs, the blog said. It will initially be available as a manual download at the Microsoft Download Center and as an optional update via Microsoft Update. After 90 days, it will be delivered via Automatic Update.

About the Author

Gladys Rama (@GladysRama3) is the editorial director of Converge360.

Featured

  • Microsoft Offers Support Extensions for Exchange 2016 and 2019

    Microsoft has introduced a paid Extended Security Update (ESU) program for on-premises Exchange Server 2016 and 2019, offering a crucial safety cushion as both versions near their Oct. 14, 2025 end-of-support date.

  • An image of planes flying around a globe

    2025 Microsoft Conference Calendar: For Partners, IT Pros and Developers

    Here's your guide to all the IT training sessions, partner meet-ups and annual Microsoft conferences you won't want to miss.

  • Notebook

    Microsoft Centers AI, Security and Partner Dogfooding at MCAPS

    Microsoft's second annual MCAPS for Partners event took place Tuesday, delivering a volley of updates and directives for its partners for fiscal 2026.

  • Microsoft Layoffs: AI Is the Obvious Elephant in the Room

    As Microsoft doubles down on an $80 billion bet on AI this fiscal year, its workforce reductions are drawing scrutiny over whether AI's ascent is quietly reshaping its human capital strategy, even as official messaging avoids drawing a direct line.