Office updates for new Japanese era

On May 1, 2019, a new Japanese era and its associated calendar began. Most Office products that support the Japanese calendar and are within their support life cycle have been updated to reflect the new era.

The Office team will continue to release updates for client and mobile versions (including iOS and Android) of Office products on the regular monthly release schedule. Future updates will contain fixes and features such as fonts and the IME that are heavily dependent on the recent announcement of the new era name. Note that in addition to the Office updates, customers have to verify that the operating system (Windows, iOS, MacOS, or Android) is updated and supports the new era.

To ensure customers have the best possible experience when the era begins, some Office products will display the new era prior to its start on May 1. 

To learn more about the Microsoft effort to prepare for the new Japanese era, see Updates for May 2019 Japanese Era Change.

As always, we welcome any feedback that you may have about the updates. For more information, see How do I give feedback on Microsoft Office?

Office for Windows 

For Office on Windows to correctly handle the new Japanese era, both Windows and .NET Framework must be updated to versions that support the new era.  For more information about how to make these updates, refer to the Windows updates and .NET Framework updates sections. To install the latest Office updates, see Install Office Updates. 

Office for Mac, Office for Android, and Office for iOS  

For other devices (Mac, Android or iOS), updates for the specific platform are available from the store for that platform and will be applied according to the store's update policy.  Make sure to install updates for both the operating system and Office applications.  

In order to get the latest Japanese era updates, install the most recent version that's listed in the linked release notes:

• Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise – Monthly Channel
• Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise - Semi-Annual Channel
• Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise – Semi-Annual Targeted Channel
• Office 2019

The following table provides a list of Microsoft Knowledge Base articles by Office version for Japanese era updates as of this posting. We will offer additional updates for Office as they become available, and we will update this article accordingly.

The system dictionary that includes the new era name is also available in the Japanese version of Microsoft Office Input Method Editor (IME) 2010. You can download it from the following download center:

Microsoft Office IME 2010 latest word dictionary update (April 2019 version)

After you install this system dictionary, the new era name is displayed in the candidate list of Office IME 2010 when you type the new era name "Reiwa".

For guidance about how to test the new Japanese era, see the "How to test the new Japanese era artifacts on Windows" section in "Summary of new Japanese Era updates - KB4469068."

Note Before you test the new Japanese era, update Office, the operating system, and .NET Framework. After you verify that these updates are installed, check whether the behavior in your Office documents and Office applications work as expected.

Together with the support for the new Japanese era, many Office products support the Gannen format. For more details about Gannen, see the "New Japanese era supported features" section of Summary of new Japanese Era updates - KB4469068.

In Microsoft Excel, dates can be formatted to display Gannen by using custom formatting or the "Format" function. For examples of how to use Gannen in Excel, see Japan era changes and Gannen.