Office 365 and Microsoft 365 subscribers get plenty of perks. But what if you don’t want to pay? What do you get for free?

That is, anyone with a Microsoft account (MSA)—originally created, perhaps, to utilize Hotmail/Outlook.com, Skype, Xbox, or whatever back in the day—has, in effect, a free Microsoft 365 account. And that free account comes with a surprisingly wide range of functionality and capability. Microsoft’s hope, of course, is that you’ll enjoy the account so much—or will be annoyed by its limitations just enough—that you’ll want to upgrade.