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February 3, 2022
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G Suite vs Office 365: Apps, Security & Pricing Compared

Every business strives for employee productivity as time is money! Business owners at some point or the other must choose their productivity tool. Using the right tools that suit your business needs is a major decision. Microsoft constantly enhances its products to meet with the changing trends of the workplace. Consequently, Office 365 is now offered in Microsoft 365.


Deciding between G Suite vs Office 365 can be daunting since both have a lot in common.

So, when choosing between the two it all depends on your specific business needs. This guide provides G Suite vs Office 365 comparison for businesses to ease your decision. We will explore the features, applications, pricing, security and compliance of both Office 365 and g suite. The home and education versions are not included in this guide.


G Suite vs Office 365 Comparison Chart of Features and Apps


Millions of businesses rely on tools to run daily business operations for collaboration, internal and external communication, and documentation to say the least. As businesses are shifting gears to remote work, easy collaboration and effective communication is the time of need. Our cherished tech giants are continuously evolving their productivity tools to keep up with business requirements.


What is G Suite?

G Suite, formerly Google Apps, is a collection of Google products to streamline business operations. Google offers these apps and services to businesses, institutions, and nonprofits on a monthly subscription via different price plans. While it's true that these products are free for everyone but there is some difference between G Suite and free google apps. The Google Productivity suite adds enterprise-level, advanced features in the Google workspace including shared calendars, optional unlimited storage (Google drive), advanced admin controls, data migration tools. Furthermore, it also comes with mobile device management, remote wipe, and custom email addresses for your domain.


What apps are included in G Suite?

G Suite includes the following apps:

  • Gmail- Custom Based Email  
  • Meet- Voice and Video Conferencing Tool
  • Docs- Word Processing Document
  • Sheets- Spreadsheets
  • Slides- Presentation Builder
  • Chat- Google Hangouts
  • Drive- Cloud Storage per user
  • Calendar- Shared Calendars
  • Forms- Survey Builder
  • Sites- Website Builder
  • Currents- Engage Employees
  • Keep – Notes and lists
  • Apps Script- Optimize how you work
  • Cloud Search- Smart search interfaces across G Suite


What is Microsoft 365?

Over the past 30 years, most of the world's population has used Microsoft products whether at school or office! Microsoft is worshipped by some of its users with over one billion users worldwide to date! Since Office 365 launch, Microsoft has been enhancing its office productivity suite. Office 365 is now offered as part of Microsoft 365 which uses a subscription-based model that includes core apps and additional apps for businesses. All the apps are connected to each other and online in Office 365 to facilitate collaboration and teamwork. Office 365 is built as a cloud-first application that supports on-the-go work. Employees can easily work anywhere, anytime, with secure access to office files and documents from any device. The desktop versions of the widely used apps are a great option and have set high standards for competitors.

The core apps in Office 365 include your most familiar, easy-to-navigate tools

  • Word
  • Excel
  • PowerPoint
  • Outlook
  • OneNote
  • One Drive for Business
  • Teams
  • Exchange
  • Publisher

G Suite vs Office 365 - Key Differences

Needless to mention, Microsoft has dominated the productivity software market for years! However, the onset of cloud services has changed the landscape of tech industry providing a level playing field for competitors.

G Suite vs Office 365 feature list has many similar functionalities such as business email addresses, secure chat and messaging, security and admin controls, video, and audio calls. The following table summarizes the key difference between Office 365 and g suite.


FEATURES & APPS

MICROSOFT 365

G SUITE

Word Processing

Word

Docs

Spreadsheets

Excel

Sheets

Presentations

PowerPoint

Slides

Emails

Outlook

Gmail

Note-Taking

OneNote

Keep

Surveys

Forms

Forms

Team Intranet

SharePoint

Google Sites

Internal Communication/Social Networking

Yammer

Currents

Video Conferencing

Teams

Google Meet

Video Sharing

Stream

-

Messaging

Teams

Chat

Archive Data

-

Vault

Cloud Storage

One Drive

Drive

Calendars

Outlook Calendar

Google Calendar

Desktop Version

Yes

-

Web Version

Yes

Yes

Mobile Version

Yes

Yes


Verdict: Based on features alone, Microsoft is a clear winner! Microsoft offers all three versions of its apps (desktop, web and mobile). Desktop versions of these apps are easy to navigate as mobile and web apps lack luster. Microsoft’s apps are feature-rich providing the necessary tools for easy collaboration and communication to everyone in an enterprise.


A Comparison of G Suite vs Office 365 Pricing


G Suite is the real alternative to Office 365 that also offers free versions of apps such as Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides. However, both G Suite vs Office 365 offer subscription services to businesses and enterprises of all sizes. G Suite vs Office 365 pricing main difference is at the enterprise-level plans as Microsoft requires customers to pay upfront for the year.


G Suite Pricing

G Suite offers three subscription levels ranging from $6-25 per user monthly as shown in the table above. In terms of functionality Google used to lag Microsoft’s desktop version of Office apps but the gap has been closed. Since users can now use web-based G Suite apps in offline mode.


Microsoft 365 Pricing and Enterprise Licensing

To avoid confusion, this guide includes Microsoft 365 pricing plans since Microsoft has recently replaced Office 365 plans with Microsoft 365 subscription plans.

Microsoft offers subscription plans for Microsoft 365 for home, business, enterprise, and education. The Business Standard and Business Premium plans provide access to the desktop versions of popular tools like Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher, and Access. Though, all the Microsoft 365 subscription plans give direct access to the web and mobile versions of your favorite apps.


G Suite vs Office 365 Comparison: Features & Apps Included in Price Plans

Microsoft has recently revised subscription plans of Office 365, which is now offered in Microsoft 365. So, rather than paying for just Office 365 you get a bundle of services that includes Office 365, operating system, and security tools. The following table provides a comparison of different subscription plans offered in Microsoft 365 and G Suite.


Microsoft 365

G Suite

Subscription Plan

Microsoft 365

Business Basic

(Formerly Office 365 Business Essentials)

Microsoft 365 Business Standard

(Formerly Office 365 Business Premium)

Microsoft 365 Business Premium

(Formerly Microsoft 365 Business)

Basic

Business

Enterprise

Price

$5.00

$ 12.50

$ 20.00

$6.00

$ 12.00

$25.00

Cloud Storage

1TB

  1TB

1TB

30 GB

Unlimited

Unlimited

Email Storage

50GB

50GB

50GB

30GB

30GB

30GB

Custom Domain

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Calendaring

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Business Email

Outlook

Outlook

Outlook

Outlook

Outlook

Outlook

Web Versions

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Mobile Versions

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Desktop Versions

 No

Yes

Yes

No

No

No

Word Processing

Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word

Microsoft Word

Docs

Docs

Docs

Spreadsheets

Excel

Excel

Excel

Sheets

Sheets

Sheets

Presentations

PowerPoint

PowerPoint

PowerPoint

Slides

Slides

Slides

Video & Voice Conferencing

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams

Meet

Meet

Meet

Messaging

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams

Chat

Chat

Chat

Team Intranet

SharePoint

SharePoint

SharePoint

Sites

Sites

Sites

Archive Data

-

-

-

-

Vault

Vault

Device Management

-

-

Yes

-

-

Yes

What is the Difference between Office 365 and Microsoft 365 Pricing?

The new product bundle of services includes Office 365, Windows 10 Enterprise Mobility + Security (EM+S). In addition to Business plans, Microsoft offers Enterprise plans for larger organizations. The Enterprise plans are only available as an annual commitment. However, Business plans are available monthly and in yearly subscriptions.

The following are key features included in the enterprise plans:

  • Microsoft Phone System (PSTN calling is available as an add-on in E3 and E5)
  • Advanced Information Protection
  • Advanced Threat Protection
  • Active Directory integration
  • Power BI
  • MyAnalytics
  • Litigation Hold
  • Unlimited archive and mail storage
  • Enterprise app management

The following table shows both Microsoft 365 and Office 365 enterprise licensing plans:

Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise

(Formerly Office 365 ProPlus)

$12.00 user per month

(annual commitment)

Microsoft 365 E5

$57.00 user/month

 (annual commitment)

Microsoft 365 E3

$32.00 user/month

 (annual commitment)

Microsoft 365 F3

$10.00 user/month

(annual commitment)

Office 365 E1
(Online services and online versions of the Office apps, but does not include desktop apps)

$8.00 per user/month

(annual commitment)

Office 365 E3

(Includes all features of Microsoft 365, Office 365 E1 plus information protection and compliance capabilities)

$20.00 per user/month

(annual commitment)

Office 365 E5

 (Includes Office 365 apps, advanced voice, analytics, security, and compliance services)

$35.00 per user/month

(annual commitment)


Verdict: In the neck-to-neck G Suite vs Office 365 comparison, Microsoft scores higher than Google! $5.00-$20.00 of 1TB Cloud Storage is big bang for the buck! Also, Microsoft’s Enterprise Licenses must not be overlooked as they are great saving for organizations of all sizes.  


Office 365 vs G Suite: Security Features at a glance!


In the Office 365 vs g suite, you can expect the highest standards of security with both these productivity powerhouses! Both Office 365 and G Suite are neck and neck when it comes to security infrastructures. Google takes malware threats seriously! Google has a massive network of data centers with complete monitoring of its hardware. On the other hand, Microsoft has the highest security standards and international compliance.


How Secure is G Suite?

G Suite is designed with strict privacy and security standards offering full data encryption:

  • Data Loss Protection
  • Malware Protections
  • Spam Detection
  • Brand phishing defense
  • Phishing Prevention

Google has the following compliance certifications:

  • ISO 27001, 27018
  • SOC 2, SOC 3
  • HIPAA
  • FERPA
  • COPPA
  • EU Data Protection Directive and GDPR
  • User Access


Microsoft 365 Security and Compliance

Microsoft 365 is designed to keep Cloud security in mind. Office 365 has a lot of security features including:

  • Multi-factor authentication (MFA)
  • Mobile device management (ATP)
  • Advanced Threat Protection
  • Encrypted Email
  • Azure Identity Protection (AIP)
  • Azure Active Directory (Azure AD)
  • Privileged Identity Management (PIM)
  • Data Loss Prevention (DLP)

Office 365 has the following compliance certifications:

  • ISO 27001, 27018
  • SSAE16
  • SOC1 Type II & SOC2 Type II
  • FISMA
  • HIPAA
  • EU Data Protection Directive and GDPR
  • User Access & Administration

Verdict: Both Microsoft and Google use high standards of security and compliance and run neck to neck. When it comes to Office 365 vs g suite security then clearly Microsoft is the winner! Simply because it uses Multi-Factor Authentication as compared with G Suite’s two-factor authentication. The wide range of third-party apps and extensions that g suite platform relates to makes it risky as users grant permissions.


So, which is better for your business - Microsoft 365 or G Suite?


Choosing between these two-productivity tools is not easy since they both are remarkably similar. Both Microsoft and Google have millions of users with some ardent fans. Google started grounding up while Microsoft did some reverse engineering! Microsoft gradually moved towards web and mobile versions from its original robust desktop apps. Whereas Google started on the web but was compelled to add powerful features to match desktop Office apps.


Microsoft Ecosystem

Most businesses are automatically tied to the Microsoft ecosystem with Windows PCs hence this can be a deciding factor in choosing Office 365. If you want unlimited cloud storage to share large video or image files across multiple devices, then pick G Suite. The fact that Microsoft offers all three versions of apps (desktop, web, mobile) is a solid reason to choose Office 365.


Budget Constraints

If you have budget constraints, then Microsoft’s business plans with 1TB is the way to go!


Familiar Grounds

Since decades, Microsoft Office applications have been the industry standard. They have and continuously impress the masses with their comprehensive set of features. They keep building on their productivity tools to meet the changing demands of the business world!


Conclusion

Signing off, the desktop version of Office 365 apps is the biggest reason to choose Office 365.  As organizations share documents with clients that can be easily shared and edited, Office 365 is a natural fit for organizations. With easy-to-use, feature-rich products, Office 365 is a clear winner! Microsoft has and will always remain the first productivity apps many people used over the years. Book a strategy call with us now to get started!

Last Updated 5 months ago

About the Author

Favad Qaisar is Founder & CEO of Communication Square LLC. He is a Microsoft Certified Expert and a Charter Member. In the past he has worked with Microsoft Teams Product Group and has also Co-Authored Microsoft Certification Exams.

Beyond work he loves playing Chess.

Favad Qaisar

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