iWork facts for kids

iWork

iWork suite, clockwise from top left: Pages, Numbers and Keynote on macOS; and iWork for iCloud in Safari 14

Original author(s)

Apple

Developer(s)

Apple

Initial release

January 11, 2004; 21 years ago

Stable release

14.0

/ 2 April 2024

Preview release

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Written in

Objective-C, C, JavaScript

Operating system

Online: Clients: All devices with a modern web browser
Apps: iOS, iPadOS, and macOS

Platform

x86-64
ARM (A4 and M1 onward)
PowerPC (until 2009)

Type

Office suite

License

Proprietary
Freeware and commercial

iWork is a set of useful computer programs made by Apple. These programs help you create documents, presentations, and spreadsheets. You can use iWork on Apple devices like Mac computers, iPads, and iPhones. It's also available online through the iCloud website, so you can use it on other computers too!

iWork includes three main apps:

Keynote for making cool presentations.
Pages for writing documents and designing layouts.
Numbers for organizing information in spreadsheets.

Apple designed iWork to make it easy for Mac users to create good-looking documents. It uses macOS's many fonts, built-in spell checker, and graphics tools.

You might have heard of Microsoft Office. iWork apps are similar to Microsoft Office apps:

Pages is like Microsoft Word.
Numbers is like Microsoft Excel.
Keynote is like PowerPoint.

While Microsoft Office apps can't usually open iWork files directly, iWork apps are smart! They can open Microsoft Office documents for you to edit. You can also save your iWork files (like `.pages`, `.numbers`, `.key`) into Microsoft Office formats (like `.docx`, `.xlsx`, `.pptx`) or as PDF files.

The oldest app in iWork is Keynote. It was first released in 2003. Steve Jobs, who co-founded Apple, used it for his famous presentations. He once said, "It's for when your presentation really matters."

Pages joined the iWork family in 2004. Numbers was added later in 2007. In 2009, iWork also offered a test version of iWork.com. This was an online service to share documents, which is now part of Apple's iCloud service.

iWork apps for iOS (iPhone and iPad) came out in 2010 with the first iPad. They have been updated regularly since then. In 2013, Apple launched iWork web apps on iCloud. These let you work on your documents using a web browser.

iWork used to cost money, but in October 2013, Apple made all three iWork apps free for new Apple devices. In April 2017, iWork became completely free for everyone on macOS and iOS, even for older devices. iWork for iCloud, which lets you store and share documents online, is also free for all iCloud users.

Since September 2016, iWork apps also have a cool feature called real-time collaboration. This means you can work on the same document with your friends or classmates at the same time! It's similar to Google Docs.

How iWork Started and Grew
iWork Apps and What They Do
Images for kids
See also

How iWork Started and Grew

The first version of iWork was called iWork '05. It was announced on January 11, 2005. It included Keynote 2 and Pages. iWork '05 cost US$79, and you could also download a free 30-day trial.

Apple said iWork was a "successor to AppleWorks", which was an older Apple program. However, iWork didn't have all the same tools as AppleWorks, like its database or drawing features. But iWork worked well with Apple's iLife apps. This meant you could easily drag and drop music from iTunes, videos from iMovie, and photos from iPhoto into your iWork documents.

iWork '06 came out on January 10, 2006. It had updated versions of Keynote and Pages. These were the first versions that could run smoothly on both older PowerPC Macs and the newer Intel Macs.

The next big update, iWork '08, was released on August 7, 2007. This version brought a brand new app: Numbers! Numbers was different from other spreadsheet programs like Microsoft Excel. It let you create documents with many spreadsheets on a flexible canvas, using cool built-in templates.

iWork '09 was released on January 6, 2009. It updated all three apps. This version also gave access to a test version of the iWork.com service. This service let users share documents online until it was replaced by iCloud in July 2012. You could upload a document directly from Pages, Keynote, or Numbers. Others could then view it, add comments, and download it in different formats.

On January 27, 2010, Apple announced iWork for iPad. Each app cost $9.99. These apps have been updated many times, including versions for iPhone and iPod Touch.

On October 22, 2013, Apple announced a big update for iWork on both Mac and iOS. These updates were free for people who already owned iWork. They also became free for anyone who bought a new Mac or iOS device after October 1, 2013.

Some users found that the new Mac versions of iWork (from 2013) had removed some features that were in older versions. Apple listened to feedback and slowly added some of these features back in later updates.

Since 2016, Apple has made it possible for all iWork apps to have real-time collaboration. This means you can work on a document with others at the same time, whether you're using the apps on your device or the online iWork for iCloud versions.

iWork Apps and What They Do

Common Features Across Apps

All iWork apps share many cool features because they are built using similar Apple technologies. For example, they all have a great spell checker that works in many languages. You can also find grammar checking, find-and-replace tools, and easy ways to pick styles and colors.

A special thing about iWork apps is how they handle documents. In most programs, like a word processor, text is the main thing. In a spreadsheet, cells are the main thing. Other things, like pictures or charts, are attached to that main thing.

But in iWork, all apps use a common "canvas" as their base. Think of it like a blank drawing board. Each app then adds its own special objects to this canvas. For example, Pages starts with a big text box on the canvas, making it look like a normal word processor. But you can easily resize that text box or add other objects like images or shapes, just like in a design program. In Numbers, you see a grid of cells, but you can make it smaller and add many different tables, charts, or drawings to the same canvas.

This makes iWork apps very flexible for arranging things on your page.

Desktop Applications

Pages: Your Word Processor and Designer

Pages is Apple's word processing app. It's great for writing essays, reports, and stories.

Beyond just typing, Pages comes with many ready-made designs (templates) from Apple. You can use these to quickly create things like newsletters, invitations, and résumés. There are even templates for school projects like reports and outlines.

Pages works well with Apple's iLife apps. You can easily drag and drop videos, photos, and music from your iLife library right into your Pages documents. There's also a Full Screen view that hides menus, so you can focus on your writing. An outline mode helps you organize your thoughts and rearrange them easily.

Pages can open and edit Microsoft Word documents (both older `.doc` and newer `.docx` files). It can also open plain text files. You can save your Pages documents as Word files, PDFs, or ePubs (for e-books).

Pages is a powerful tool for creating good-looking documents for school or personal use.

Keynote: Make Amazing Presentations

Keynote is the app for creating and showing presentations. It has many features similar to Microsoft PowerPoint, but also some unique ones.

Like Pages and Numbers, Keynote connects with your iLife apps. You can easily add media from iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and Aperture directly into your Keynote slides. Keynote offers many templates, cool transitions between slides, and special effects. A feature called Magic Move can automatically animate images and text that appear on different slides, making them look like they're smoothly transforming.

Keynote saves presentations as `.key` files. It can open and edit Microsoft PowerPoint (`.ppt`) files. You can also save your Keynote presentations as PowerPoint files, QuickTime videos (which play on iPods and iPhones), HTML files (for web pages), and PDF files. You can even send presentations directly to other Apple apps or to YouTube.

Numbers: Smart Spreadsheets for Everyone

Numbers is the spreadsheet app that joined iWork in 2007. Like Microsoft Excel, Numbers helps you organize data in tables, do calculations with formulas, and create charts and graphs.

What makes Numbers special is that you can have many tables in one document on a flexible canvas. This means you're not stuck with just one big grid. Numbers includes many pre-made templates for things like personal budgets, school projects, and business plans.

Numbers 2.0, released with iWork '09, brought improvements. For example, charts you paste into Keynote and Pages will automatically update if you change the data in Numbers. Numbers also lets you group and summarize data in your tables easily.

Online Services

iWork for iCloud: Work Anywhere

iWork for iCloud was announced in 2013. It lets you use Pages, Numbers, and Keynote right in your web browser! This means you can work on your documents from almost any computer, even if it's not an Apple device.

You can access these web apps (Pages for iCloud, Numbers for iCloud, Keynote for iCloud) through the iCloud website using your Apple ID. They also sync with the apps on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac, so your documents are always up-to-date everywhere.

A great feature of iWork for iCloud is real-time collaboration. You and your friends can open the same document at the same time and make changes together. It's super helpful for group projects!

iWork for iCloud works with popular web browsers like Safari, Chrome, and Internet Explorer. This means even Microsoft Windows users can now use Apple's document editing tools online. While the web versions have fewer features than the desktop apps, they are still very powerful for editing and creating documents on the go. Apple has continued to add more languages and fonts to iWork for iCloud over time.

Images for kids

The old iWork.com logo
A screenshot of the iWork.com website