Office 365 vs G Suite: Which one suits best for your business| i2k2 Networks

The market is loaded with all kinds of productivity applications nowadays. Obviously, Microsoft and Google, the two very big service providers, are in continuous competition with each other to avail the best-suited applications to its users, not only to keep the old customers intact but also to lure the new ones too. Two of the best applications present these days are: G Suite by Google and Office 365 by Microsoft. Both the applications offer communication tools and file storage along with office tools. Here we have explained which one best suits your business – Office 365 vs G Suite.

What is Office 365 and G Suite?

Office 365 and G Suite (formerly known as Google Apps) are cloud-based productivity suites that offer a range of tools and services for businesses, including email, calendar, word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software.

Microsoft 365 cloud: Microsoft 365 or Office 365, or Outlook 365, is a subscription service offered by Microsoft that includes access to a range of productivity tools, such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. It also includes cloud storage and collaboration tools, such as OneDrive and Teams.
G Suite: G Suite is a suite of productivity tools offered by Google that includes Gmail, Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, and Google Calendar. It also includes cloud storage and collaboration tools, such as Google Drive and Hangouts.

Business suites from both Google & Office 365 are designed to help businesses improve productivity and collaboration by leveraging a range of tools and services that can be accessed from anywhere and on any device. They offer similar capabilities, but there are some differences between the two suites in terms of the specific tools and services they offer.

5 Cool Features of Office 365 That Every Business Owner Should Know

There is a long list of features included in Microsoft 365 that can help increase productivity for businesses and employees. The best part is that Office 365 features are easy to adapt and come with a low entry barrier. Let’s check the top 5 cool features of 365 Microsoft, business owners must know:

Real-time co-authoring

Windows 365 cloud’s real-time co-authoring feature allows for online collaboration and real-time viewing of each other’s edits and feedback. To allow people to collaborate with you on a file, save it to OneDrive or SharePoint. The sidebar is incorporated right inside the application, so you may share your files straight from there, without having to juggle between apps.

Chat with co-workers

You can communicate, share screens, and have audio or video discussions with your coworkers using the Microsoft Teams in-app integrations in the Microsoft Office 365 business app. Additionally, you don’t even need to exit the application you’re using! Even if you do close the application, you can keep communicating with your team while they edit by using Teams on your desktop or mobile device.

Inserting links to stored files

It’s time to forget about email attachments. With cloud office infrastructure at your disposal, you can upload your content to the cloud storage simply by putting a link to the file in your cloud rather than an attachment. When you email someone, Outlook will automatically give them permission to edit the document. Also, the permissions can be changed whenever you desire.

Power Map: Turning data into a map

The robust and dynamic data visualization tools in Excel, including Power Map, are improved by Power BI, a tool for analyzing, visualizing, and sharing data insights. With Power Map, you can create an interactive 3D map out of rows of data and filter it using one of three options:

List
Range
Advanced

Intelligent email inbox for automatic de-cluttering

Using your mailbox settings, Microsoft’s Clutter function will automatically arrange your email so that messages with the highest priority are displayed first. The Clutter folder can be used to store emails that you want to access later.

5 Key Benefits of Using Office 365 for Business

Efficiency is crucial for businesses to succeed. When used tactically, Office 365 can bring numerous benefits to your workplace. In this section, we will discuss the 5 key benefits of using Office 365 for business:

Universal file access

Your organization can store all of its valuable information in the cloud, thanks to Office 365. The data can be accessed from any location and on any device, all you need is an internet connection. In short, Office 365 gives you access to all the apps and files you require when away from the office, enabling you to stay on top of your company affairs all the time.

Secure Cloud Storage

Office 365 provides a completely safe environment with strong security controls in place, such as two-factor authentication, which makes sure unauthorized users can’t access your files even if they somehow manage to get on your device. Security risks are quickly recognized and eliminated, thanks to threat detection and anti-malware features, which is crucial for businesses dealing with sensitive data or information. By utilizing Office 365, your company can now conduct business without worrying about security.

Improved Communication

Users of Office 365 have access to technologies that help centralize communication between Skype and Outlook. You can cooperate and always communicate, regardless of location or time difference. For cross-departmental cooperation and document co-authoring, Teams offers an instant messaging feature where comments can be posted and files can be uploaded, simultaneously. With the help of all these capabilities, you can now stay in continual communication with your teams and workers at all times, no matter where they are located.

Centralized Collaboration

Office 365 brings forward state-of-the-art collaboration technologies, enabling you to share mailboxes, calendars, contacts, and edit documents in real-time. Calendar sharing on Exchange allows you to know who is available and when; allowing you to organize meetings to make it convenient for everyone to join. On the other hand, shared mailboxes allow numerous users to access the same inbox. In this regard, messages can be filtered to land in shared mailboxes, so they are never missed. SharePoint is another essential tool that fosters collaboration. Any staff member can access the documents kept here, edit them, and send links via email. As mentioned earlier, co-authoring is made simple by allowing multiple users to update documents that are saved in SharePoint in real-time.

Predictable spending

Office 365 follows a subscription model, where users are charged on a per-user, per-month basis. The degree of functionality you select for your business will determine the overall cost of your licenses. The cost of each license is determined by the various enterprise levels, which contain various applications and products. Paying per user, every month, ensures a predictable outlay and aids in planning your IT budget for the coming year without causing stress. You can rest assured about no unexpected charges.

It is important to think carefully about two important factors before proceeding with any one of them.

Need for your organization – You need to reconsider both the functional and non-functional factors of your organization. Functional factors include productivity and collaboration whereas the non –functional factors focus on SLAs, requirements of your strategic alliances in terms of features and benefits.

Need of Employees – A better work balance and satisfied employees are the key to success and growth for any organization. So, it is necessary to think about them before taking the decision as what are they using now and will they be comfortable enough to work in the new environment.

For organizations, switching to cloud, Office 365 and G Suite is the most prevalent cloud-based productivity tools. So, let’s just compare both the application models to get to know some real differences between them before we start working with them.

Office 365 versus G Suite comparison

– Some of the factors that can help you choose among them are:

Information Protection

Office 365 – With the right management and data loss protection policies offered by Office 365 the information is kept intact. The Right management Features are kept at an email/file level regardless of their transactions and storage. On the other hand, the data loss protection capabilities cover email, sites, and files.
G Suite – Just as O365, G Suite offers both right management and data loss protection. The right Management feature allows the users to disable downloading, printing and copying of any specific Google Drive file, but only if it stays within google ecosystem. Whereas, the data loss protection only covers Gmail.

Scalability

Office 365 – Microsoft O365 offers a service level agreement of 99.9% with its users. The on-demand services are scalable and depend on the specific requirements of the organizations.
G Suite – On the other hand, Google also guarantees a service level agreement of 99.9% among its users. The on-demand services are specific to the customer’s requirements and are highly scalable.

Cloud Storage

Office 365: Offers 1 TB of online cloud storage per users, regardless of the plan chosen by the customers.
G Suite: Offers 30 GB of online Cloud storage per user basic accounts or unlimited storage for business, team or enterprise accounts having at least 5 active users.

Online Applications

Office 365 – It provides easy-to-use online versions of various applications such as Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint.
G Suite – G Suite offers online versions of some of their popular applications such as Gmail, Hangouts, Drive and Docs. Many customers find the G Suite apps superior to the Microsoft applications.

Productivity

Office 365 – The documents views and user experiences of O365 are consistent regardless of the device being used. Users can easily access the documents being online or offline.
G Suite – In the case of G Suite, documents views and user experiences are inconsistent, and offline capabilities are limited. Also, G Suite does not allow the users to share Office documents unless they are converted to Google format. This sometimes may lead to formatting issues. This makes the O365 more popular choice.

Bottom Line

It is important to consider the differences between these two application platforms before taking down any user agreement. G Suite might be taken into consideration for small enterprises as for them there are enough features that can help them expand their business. Whereas Microsoft Office 365 can be purchased when employees are accustomed to the standard products of Microsoft.

If you also require Office 365 for Business or G Suite for your business requirements, you can contact i2k2 Networks, a dedicated web hosting company with the wide offering of email solutions. Over the years, we have been providing state-of-the-art dedicated hosting in India. Our customers’ trust along with our dedication to excellence has helped us emerge as one of the top data center companies in India. Contact us at +91-120-466 3031 | +91-971-177-4040 or can drop a mail at sales@i2k2.com

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Office 365 vs G Suite: Which one suits best for your business?