I think 2019 was the last non 365 version I used and didn't really notice much difference, but I don't really use many of the features introduced in later versions anyway.

I went through this with 2024 recently, for a person who deals with accountants and such and therefore really needs Excel. It was an upgrade from Office 2013 upon getting a new machine.

The hardest part is actually getting the installer. All the links pointing to Office 2024 on the MS website would just silently redirect you to Office 365 instead. The answer ended up being the Microsoft ODT, a command line utility, and you have to pass an XML file to it to specify the version you want. It was straightforward to follow from an example.

The other issue is you literally cannot activate without signing in to a Microsoft account, even with a keycard in this case. And it seemed to auto sign you into Edge (but you could opt out of signing into Windows with an MS account). It took a bit of fiddling/looking around in the registry to get fully signed out of Office, Edge, and everything else when done activation. You can stay signed out after activating.

The major downside seems that security support for 2024 is scheduled to end in 2029, so only 5 year lifecycle. When you divide the cost by 5 years, especially if you didn't buy it right away, it's quite expensive and eats into the cost advantage over 365. Unless you just continue to use it past EOL...