Office 365 for Education replaces Live@edu, which will remain available for 18 more months to give its customers -- about 10,000 educational institutions with about 22 million students in about 130 countries -- a window for planning and carrying out the migration.

It remains to be seen how straightforward or complicated Live@edu customers will find the transition to Office 365 for Education.

Migrations to the business editions of Office 365, launched in mid-2011, have triggered complaints from customers of other Microsoft cloud suites Office 365 has replaced, including Office Live Small Business (OLSB) and Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS).

Although Office 365 is a cloud-based suite, it can require upgrades to customers' PC and server software, as well as Internet domain and website transfers, depending on the case.

Microsoft already has information online about from Live@edu to Office 365 for Education.