Perkembangan Microsoft Office, termasuk Microsoft Access, demikian cepatnya sehingga muncul versi-versi baru. Saat ini, sejak versi 2016 "yang biasa" sudah tersedia Access 2019, Access 2021, dan Access 365. Pada ketiga versi terakhir ini, tersedia Access Runtime di bawah judul "Microsoft 365 Access Runtime".

Ada hal berbeda yang sangat penting bagi developer jika ingin aplikasi yang dibuatnya bisa jalan di Access yang baru (2019, 2021, dan 365), antara lain pada string koneksi untuk mengakses database dari file yang lain.

Berikut ini saya copas saja keterangannya dari situs Microsoft, biar tidak bias.

The Access 365 Runtime is like previous runtimes in that all design-related UI is either removed or disabled. The Access 365 Runtime includes the Access Database Engine which contains a set of components that facilitate the transfer of data between existing Microsoft Office files such as Microsoft Office Access (*.mdb and *.accdb) files and Microsoft Office Excel (*.xls, *.xlsx, and *.xlsb) files to other data sources such as Microsoft SQL Server. Connectivity to existing text files is also supported. ODBC and OLEDB drivers are installed for application developers to use in developing their applications with connectivity to Office file formats. 

The Access Database Engine is not intended: 

• If you need a general replacement for Jet you should use SQL Server Express Edition.
• As a replacement for the Jet OLEDB Provider in server-side applications.
• As a general word processing, spreadsheet or database management system -To be used as a way to create files. (You can use Microsoft Office or Office automation to create the files that Microsoft Office supports.)
• To be used by a system service or server-side program where the code will run under a system account, or will deal with multiple users identities concurrently, or is highly reentrant and expects stateless behavior. Examples would include a program that is run from task scheduler when no user is logged in, or a program called from server-side web application such as ASP.NET, or a distributed component running under COM+ services.

• If you are the user of an application, consult your application documentation for details on how to use the appropriate driver.
• If you are an application developer using OLEDB, set the Provider argument of the ConnectionString property to “Microsoft.ACE.OLEDB.12.0”.
• If you are connecting to Microsoft Office Excel data, add the appropriate Extended Properties of the OLEDB connection string based on the Excel file type:

              File Type (extension)                                          Extended Properties 

              --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

              Excel 97-2003 Workbook (.xls)                         "Excel 8.0" 

              Excel Workbook (.xlsx)                                        "Excel 12.0 Xml" 

              Excel Macro-enabled workbook (.xlsm)      "Excel 12.0 Macro" 

              Excel Non-XML binary workbook (.xlsb)     "Excel 12.0" 
 

• If you are an application developer using ODBC to connect to Microsoft Office Access data, set the Connection String to “Driver={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb, *.accdb)};DBQ=path to mdb/accdb file”.
• If you are an application developer using ODBC to connect to Microsoft Office Excel data, set the Connection String to “Driver={Microsoft Excel Driver (*.xls, *.xlsx, *.xlsm, *.xlsb)};DBQ=path to xls/xlsx/xlsm/xlsb file”.