(Formerly Office 365 ProPlus) | ||||
$12.00 user/month (Annual commitment) | $7.75 user/month (Annual commitment) | $20.75 user/month (Annual commitment) | $35.75 user/month (Annual commitment) | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Publisher, OneDrive for Business, Access | Exchange, OneNote, OneDrive for Business, Sway, Sites, Yammer, Delve, Stream | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Exchange, OneNote, OneDrive for Business, Access, Sway, Sites, Yammer, Delve, Stream, Publisher | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Exchange, OneNote, OneDrive for Business, Access, Sway, Sites, Yammer, Delve, Stream, Publisher, Power BI | |
Yes | No | Yes | Yes | |
5 tablets/5 phones per user | No | 5 tablets/5 phones per user | 5 tablets/5 phones per user | |
No | Option to add Teams Enterprise at $5.25 u./m. | Option to add Teams Enterprise at $5.25 u./m. | Option to add Teams Enterprise at $5.25 u./m. | |
No | With add-on Teams Enterprise | With add-on Teams Enterprise | With add-on Teams Enterprise | |
Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
No | Up to 50 GB | 1.5 TB | 1.5 TB | |
No | No | No | No | |
No | No | Yes | Yes | |
No | No | No | Yes | |
No | No | Yes | Yes | |
No | No | No | Yes | |
Yes | No | Yes | Yes | |
No | No | No | Yes | |
No | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
No | No | Yes | Yes | |
Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
No | Plan 1 | Plan 2 | Plan 2 | |
No | No | No | Yes |
The unit price for each Office 365 Business and Enterprise plan goes from $6 to $38. The costs can shoot up quickly for organizations with a large number of users. However, you can save money if you organize your plan properly taking into consideration the right functionalities you need. Bundling your required services into your license can help you save a lot of money.
If an organization has less than 300 users, both Office 365 plans – Business and Enterprise – can be available. As large organizations use Office 365 plans, you might be still wondering which the right Office 365 plan for you is.
Features of Office 365 Enterprise plans:
If you are willing to opt for an annual commitment, you can go for the Enterprise plan. But Business plans are also available on a monthly subscription, as well as a yearly subscription.
Fundamentally, Office 365 Business plans were made for small and medium businesses (SMEs) that have fewer than 300 users. Office 365 can be overwhelming with a lot of features, and small businesses might not need them all. Thus, they can opt for Office 365 Business plans.
Let’s see how small businesses can use the Office 365 Business plans. Comparison between Office 365 Business plans:
$4.75/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Small businesses that don’t depend on Office 365 apps too much.
If you want the basic functions of Office 365 without all the bells and whistles, Office 365 Business Essentials is the best plan for you.
What you get in the Office 365 Business Essentials plan:
$8.30/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Small businesses that require only Office 365 apps, online storage, and file sharing
What you get in Office 365 Business plan :
$12.50/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Small businesses that require recent versions of Office 365 applications, preferably desktop versions.
It is the costliest business plan in Office 365. Enterprise E1 is cheaper than Business Premium, so the right choice should be made after looking at all the features.
What you get in the Office 365 Business Premium plan:
As the name suggests, Office 365 Enterprise plans are for large enterprises that have more than 300 users. Big companies need more vigorous solutions because their needs are more complicated than those SME. The plans focus more on the needs of enterprise, which heavily focus on compliance and security issues.
Office 365 Enterprise plans offer three plans: E1, E3, E5. These plans are available on the annual contract only.
Let’s see the comparison between Office 365 Enterprise plans:
$7.75/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Enterprises that need features like data governance, but very limited use of MS Office applications
If you want to opt for an Enterprise plan within your budget, opt for the Enterprise E1 plan. This costs less than the Business Premium plan while allowing the benefits of an enterprise plan.
What you’ll get in the Office 365 Enterprise E1 plan:
$20.75/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Enterprises that need features like security, compliance, business intelligence, and voice capabilities.
At best, the E3 plan can be compared to the Business Premium plan because of similar features.
All the features of the Enterprise E1 plan are included in the E3 plan as well. In addition to that, here’s what you’ll get in the Office 365 Enterprise E3 plan:
There are more features like Exchange Online Archiving, unified eDiscovery, PSTN adding, rights management, DLP, and encryption in the Enterprise E3 plan in comparison with the Business Premium plan.
$35.75/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: The costliest Office 365 plan. Enterprises that need all the features of E1 and E3 plan. With the E5 plan, you get all the consolidated features available in Office 365.
All the features of the Enterprise E1 & E3 plans are included in the Enterprise E5 plan as well. In addition to that, here’s what you’ll get in Office 365 Enterprise E5 plan :
$12/user/month – Annual commitment
Preferred by: Enterprises that don’t really have an email in focus but want compliance and BI features, and who use MS Office on mobile.
If you are still wondering what’s the right Office 365 plan for you, talk to our Sales team. We’ll understand your requirements, and propose the best possible solution for you.
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There are several different Microsoft 365 license types and choosing the correct Microsoft 365 licensing is an important step for every business, especially organizations in the cloud. Microsoft offers tiered solutions for small, medium, and enterprise sized businesses. While this allows companies to right-size licensing to their specific needs, it can also create confusion about which license is the right one. This blog will highlight the difference between Office 365 and Microsoft 365 products so you can make an informed decision.
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When comparing Microsoft 365 license types, price is understandably one of the first considerations for decision-makers, with core capabilities as a close second. As of April 1st, 2024, Microsoft Teams is no longer included in Microsoft 365 and Office 365 licensing but is available as a standalone purchase. Below are the prices* for Microsoft 365 Business, Microsoft 365 Enterprise, and Office 365 Enterprise licenses.
Microsoft Licensing Plan | Price Per User Per Month |
---|---|
Microsoft 365 E5 (no Teams) | $54.80 |
Microsoft 365 E3 (no Teams) | $33.80 |
Microsoft 365 F3 (no Teams) | $7.50 |
Microsoft 365 F1 (no Teams) | $1.75 |
Microsoft 365 Business Basic (no Teams) | $4.80 |
Microsoft 365 Business Standard (no Teams) | $10.30 |
Microsoft 365 Business Premium (no Teams) | $19.80 |
Microsoft 365 Apps for business | $8.30 |
Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise | $12.00 |
Office 365 E1 (no Teams) | $7.80 |
Office 365 E3 (no Teams) | $20.80 |
Office 365 E5 (no Teams) | $35.80 |
Office 365 F3 (no Teams) | $3.50 |
The base price per user for Microsoft 365 Business and Enterprise Plans ranges from $4.80 to $54.80, and that can quickly add up for larger organizations. However, companies that utilize capabilities such as Rights Management or cloud PBX may save money by bundling these services into their licensing. Cost savings can be significant for businesses that purchase third party tools for Anti-Virus, eDiscovery, MFA, or SIEM.
Many people use Microsoft 365 and Office 365 interchangeably; however, these are markedly different products. Office 365 is Microsoft’s productivity suite and includes the core applications most think of when they think of Microsoft: Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more. It is also only one of three suites within a Microsoft 365 license.
Microsoft 365 licenses are available as Enterprise, Business, or Apps licenses. Microsoft 365 Enterprise licenses bundle three suites—Office 365, Enterprise Mobility and Security, and Windows Enterprise—at different levels (E5, E3, F3, F1). Some Microsoft 365 Business licenses include all three suites but are more limited in features. Additionally, Microsoft 365 Business licenses have a per license cap of 300 users per tenant.
Note: We strongly discourage purchasing Microsoft 365 or Office 365 from GoDaddy due to hidden costs, and lack of feature availability. To learn more, read our blog on Migrating from GoDaddy Office 365 to Microsoft Office 365 .
Microsoft 365 Enterprise is a suite that includes Office 365, Enterprise Mobility and Security, and Windows Enterprise. Microsoft 365 Enterprise gives you the enterprise security and compliance features you need, while providing cost savings through vendor consolidation, reduced management, and training overhead.
Due to its cost, the Microsoft 365 E5 license is often positioned as a luxury license for companies that want advanced security and compliance capabilities, along with automated features. The reality is that most IT teams are overworked and understaffed, at a time when cyberattacks are increasing exponentially.
Even if employees aren’t working from home, internet connectivity makes every company a potential global target and enables intellectual property to flow freely out of any unsecured environment. IT personnel are tasked with supporting business critical operations and protecting the organization from external and internal threat actors, a responsibility that’s only getting more challenging with shrinking budgets and workforce reductions.
At a minimum, we recommend having Microsoft 365 E5 licenses in place for anyone with far-reaching environment access, but strongly encourage companies to consider the business impact a breach will impose when, not if, one occurs.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $54.80/license/month |
Who It’s For | Enterprises looking for the most complete productivity and security solution available. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
AI and rules-based automatic retention policies in Teams, Outlook, SharePoint, OneDrive |
Automatic sensitivity labeling in Microsoft 365 apps, Exchange, SharePoint, and OneDrive |
Azure Virtual Desktop |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager with Premium Regulations |
DLP for Teams chat, emails and files, and endpoints |
Microsoft Advanced Threat Analytics |
Microsoft Defender XDR Full Suite |
Microsoft Purview Insider Risk Management and Information Barriers |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) |
Privileged Access Management and Privileged Identity Management |
Risk Based Conditional Access / Identity Protection |
Secure Score, Advanced Security Reports, and Access Reviews |
Sensitivity labels based on advanced classifiers (e.g., Trainable Classifiers, EDM, Named Entities, Contextual) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Windows Autopatch |
Windows Information Protection |
Azure Information Protection Plan 2 |
Desktop client apps |
Exchange Plan 2 (100 GB mailbox + up to 1.5 TB archive) |
Microsoft Entra ID P2 |
Microsoft Intune Plan 1 |
Power BI Pro |
SharePoint Plan 2 (1+ TB OneDrive storage) |
Compared to the Microsoft 365 E5 license, the Microsoft 365 E3 maintains a similar level of productivity features and allocated storage; however, it lacks machine-learning and automated security capabilities.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $33.80/license/month |
Who It’s For | Employees who want the best in productivity and collaboration and administrators who want to be assured they are operating in a secure and compliant environment. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Azure Virtual Desktop |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
Conditional Access |
DLP for emails and files |
Manual retention labels |
Microsoft Advanced Threat Analytics |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) |
Secure Score and Advanced Security Reports |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Windows Autopatch |
Windows Information Protection |
Azure Information Protection Plan 1 |
Desktop client apps |
Exchange Plan 2 (100 GB mailbox + up to 1.5 TB archive) |
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Discovery |
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Plan 1 |
Microsoft Entra ID P1 |
Microsoft Intune Plan 1 |
SharePoint Plan 2 (1+ TB OneDrive storage) |
Microsoft’s Frontline licensing is an alternative for users that need to have a digital presence in the tenant but are not but are not spending their days creating or consuming data within the environment. Frontline users may not work at a desk, but still have matching security and compliance requirements. For organizations with regulatory requirements, the Microsoft 365 F5 Security and Compliance Add-On brings the security and compliance allotments in line with a Microsoft 365 E5 license while maintaining reduced productivity capabilities and storage capacity.
The Microsoft 365 F3 comes close to matching the Enterprise Mobility and Security E3 suite (notable losses include Defender for Endpoint Plan 1 and DLP for emails and files) but has deprecated productivity applications and reduced storage allocations.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $7.50/license/month |
Who It’s For | Enterprises with a variety of productivity use cases but an unchanging security mandate. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Azure Virtual Desktop |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
Conditional Access |
Manual retention labels |
Microsoft Advanced Threat Analytics |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) |
Secure Score and Advanced Security Reports |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Windows Autopatch |
Windows Information Protection |
Azure Information Protection Plan 1 |
Microsoft 365 for mobile and the web (no desktop apps) |
Exchange Kiosk (2 GB mailbox) |
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Discovery |
Microsoft Entra ID P1 |
Microsoft Intune Plan 1 |
SharePoint Kiosk (2 GB OneDrive storage) |
As noted above, the biggest difference between a Frontline and Enterprise license is the deprecated productivity applications and reduced storage allocations. The Microsoft 365 F1 takes that up a notch by dropping down from the Microsoft 365 F3’s web and mobile only applications to read-only versions of web and mobile. Note that neither Microsoft 365 F3 or F1 supports desktop applications.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $1.75/license/month |
Who It’s For | Enterprises with a variety of productivity use cases but an unchanging security mandate. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Azure Information Protection Plan 1 |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
Conditional Access |
Exchange Kiosk (2 GB mailbox) |
Manual retention labels |
Microsoft 365 for mobile and the web - read only |
Microsoft Advanced Threat Analytics |
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Discovery |
Microsoft Entra ID P1 |
Microsoft Intune Plan 1 |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) |
Secure Score and Advanced Security Reports |
SharePoint Kiosk (2 GB OneDrive storage) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Microsoft 365 Business plans were created for small businesses that might not need all of the features of an Enterprise level license. While Enterprise licenses have no seat limitations, Microsoft 365 Business has a per license cap of 300 users per tenant.
The most powerful Microsoft Business license without going full enterprise, the Microsoft 365 Business Premium license includes business specific versions of Microsoft Defender and Windows 11. It also includes Intune, for organizations looking to leverage that capability specifically. While it does not include the full Enterprise Mobility and Security E3 product suite, it comes close.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $19.75/license/month |
Who It’s For | Businesses with fewer than 300 users that need stronger security and compliance tools, but not the full Enterprise Mobility and Security (EMS) suite. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Azure Virtual Desktop |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
Conditional Access |
DLP for emails and files |
Manual retention labels |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) |
Secure Score |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Windows Information Protection |
Azure Information Protection Plan 1 |
Desktop client apps |
Exchange Plan 1 (50 GB mailbox + 50 GB archive) |
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps Discovery |
Microsoft Defender for Business |
Microsoft Entra ID P1 |
Microsoft Intune Plan 1 |
SharePoint Plan 1 (1 TB OneDrive storage) |
Windows 11 Business |
Formerly Office 365 Business Premium, Microsoft 365 Business Standard adds critical small business tools such as desktop applications and email. It does not stack up security wise to Business Premium.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $10.25/license/month |
Who It’s For | Businesses with fewer than 300 users that need the latest desktop versions of Office applications, cloud services, and email hosting alongside small business applications. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Desktop client apps |
Exchange Plan 1 (50 GB mailbox + 50 GB archive) |
SharePoint Plan 1 (1 TB OneDrive storage) |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset |
Compliance Manager |
Exchange Online Protection |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Secure Score |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Microsoft 365 Business Basic is one of the few lower-tier licenses that includes Exchange Online Plan 1, which can make this an ideal choice for frontline users that don’t work at a desk but send a lot of email.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $4.75/license/month |
Who It’s For | Companies with fewer than 300 users that don’t rely heavily on Office 365 applications, online storage, and who do not need desktop applications |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Cloud user self-service password change and reset |
Compliance Manager |
Exchange Online Protection |
Exchange Plan 1 (50 GB mailbox + 50 GB archive) |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Secure Score |
SharePoint Plan 1 (1 TB OneDrive storage) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
The Microsoft 365 Apps licenses are stripped down to the Office 365 suite Microsoft is known for. Unlike perpetual versions of the Office 365 suite, these subscription offerings ensure all applications will always be up-to-date and supported.
Formerly known as Office 365 ProPlus, Microsoft 365 Apps for Enterprise is built for enterprise customers. In addition to automatically updated version of the core Microsoft 365 desktop apps (Outlook and Teams excluded), it includes greater security and compliance features, as well as increased deployment and management controls than its Microsoft 365 Apps for Business counterpart. Large organizations leveraging non-Microsoft vendors for communication and collaboration may choose this, along with small to medium organizations that want higher levels of IT control than the Microsoft 365 Apps for Business license supports.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $12 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Users that rely heavily on Office 365 applications (email hosting and Teams not included) and require compliance and basic business intelligence |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Delve |
Microsoft 365 Mobile App |
Microsoft Forms |
Microsoft Whiteboard |
Office Add-in Support |
Office Applications (PC & Mac) |
Office Cloud Policy Service |
Office for the Web (Visio included) |
Office Group Policy Support |
Office Telemetry |
OneDrive for Business Plan 1 |
Roaming Settings |
Shared Computer Activation |
Sway |
Virtual Desktop Use Rights |
Previously named Office 365 Business, Microsoft 365 Apps for Business provides a maximum of 300 users automatically updated editions of the commonly used Office desktop applications (sans Outlook or Teams), but without any of the additional security, communication, or administrative capabilities in Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $8. 30 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Businesses with fewer than 300 users that only need Office applications, cloud file storage, and sharing (email hosting and Teams not included) |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Microsoft 365 Mobile App |
Microsoft Forms |
Office Applications (PC & Mac) |
Office for the Web (Visio included) |
OneDrive for Business Plan 1 |
Office 365 Enterprise is Microsoft’s productivity suite and includes the core applications most think of when they think of Microsoft: Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more. It is also only one of three suites included in a Microsoft 365 license. Unlike Microsoft 365 Enterprise licenses, which bundle three suites—Office 365, Enterprise Mobility and Security, and Windows Enterprise—Office 365 Enterprise licenses lack the security and operating system tiers.
The Office 365 E5 license includes the highest level of Microsoft’s productivity capabilities, without the security and operating systems components of the Microsoft 365 E5 license. Organizations that are leveraging other vendors or services to cover those bases may find this license appealing.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $3 5.80 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Full productivity suite without added security or compliance capabilities . |
What You’ll Get |
---|
AI and rules-based automatic retention policies in Outlook, SharePoint , OneDrive |
Automatic sensitivity labeling in Microsoft 365 apps, Exchange, SharePoint, and OneDrive |
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
DLP for emails and files |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Privileged Access Management |
Secure Score |
Sensitivity labels based on advanced classifiers (e.g., Trainable Classifiers, EDM, Named Entities, Contextual) |
Desktop client apps |
Exchange Plan 2 (100 GB mailbox + up to 1.5 TB archive) |
Power BI Pro |
SharePoint Plan 2 (1+ TB OneDrive storage) |
Office 365 E3 maintains a similar level of productivity features and allocated storage as the Office 365 E5, however with less automation features and none of the security features of the Microsoft 365 E3.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $20.80 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Businesses that need the core of Microsoft’s productivity offerings and don’t need the security or compliance capabilities. |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Cloud user self-service password change and reset and hybrid user on-premises write-back |
Compliance Manager |
Desktop client apps |
DLP for emails and files |
Exchange Plan 2 (100 GB mailbox + up to 1.5 TB archive) |
Manual retention labels |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Secure Score |
SharePoint Plan 2 (1+ TB OneDrive storage) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Office 365 E1 is the least expensive Enterprise license, with a focus on services and minimal productivity (e.g., web only apps). It can be combined with Microsoft 365 Apps for Business or Enterprise.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $ 7.80 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Users that don’t need desktop versions of Outlook or Office applications . |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Compliance Manager |
Exchange Plan 1 (50 GB mailbox + 50 GB archive) |
Manual retention labels |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Secure Score |
SharePoint Plan 1 (1 TB OneDrive storage) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Only available via CSP, the Office 365 F3 is the lightest Enterprise license available. It does not have any of the security features of a Microsoft 365 F3 license and has very minimal productivity and collaboration capabilities.
The Basics | |
---|---|
Price | $ 3.50 / license /month |
Who It’s For | Desk-less, mobile, line, and floor staff that do not need desktop applications . |
What You’ll Get |
---|
Compliance Manager |
Exchange Kiosk (2 GB mailbox) |
Manual retention labels |
Microsoft 365 for mobile and the web (no desktop apps) |
Mobile Device Management (MDM) |
Secure Score |
SharePoint Kiosk (2 GB OneDrive storage) |
User Provisioning including Windows Autopilot and Single sign-on (SSO) |
Licensing isn’t always a one size fits all and if any of the licenses above don’t check all the boxes, reach out to discuss alternative strategies like add-on or standalone licenses. Agile IT’s cloud licensing services make it easy to purchase, transfer, and manage your licenses.
Have questions about which Microsoft 365 license is right for your organization? Request a quote to see how much you can save.
Published on: Jul 17, 2024 .
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SANJAY KUMAR
Choosing an Office 365 license is a critical step before migrating to the cloud. With multiple options for small, medium and enterprise businesses, navigating the differences can get overwhelming. This Office 365 license comparison will reveal the options available within Business and Enterprise options available to help you make the correct choice for your organization.
Price Comparison for Office 365 Business Plans and Enterprise Licenses
When comparing Office 365 licenses, price is one of the first questions decision-makers ask. Here are the prices of each Office 365 Business and Enterprise license:
The base price per user for Office 365 Business and Enterprise Plans ranges from $5 to $30, and this cost can quickly add up for larger organizations. On the other hand, if you rely on certain functionalities like Rights Management or cloud PBX, bundling these services into your license can actually save your organization money.
To better weigh the costs to your organization, let’s compare the features of the Office 365 Business and Enterprise plans.
How Office 365 Enterprise and Business Plans Differ
Both the Office 365 Business plans and Enterprise plans are available for organizations with fewer than 300 employees.
Because larger companies are more likely to be using Office 365 , you might be contemplating whether to go with a Business or Enterprise option.
Here are some major features you gain with Office 365 Enterprise plans:
Skype for Business Cloud (now Microsoft Teams) PBX and PSTN conferencing (PSTN calling is available as an add-on in E3 and E5)
Advanced Information Protection
Advanced Threat Protection
Active Directory integration
Delve Analytics
Litigation Hold
Unlimited archive and mail storage
Enterprise app management
Enterprise plans are only available when purchased as a one-year commitment. However, Business plans are available month to month (for a slightly higher per-user price) and in yearly subscriptions.
Here’s a breakdown of all Office 365 Business plans so you can better understand how they differ.
Office 365 Business Plans
Office 365 Business plans were created for small businesses with fewer than 300 employees that might not need all the bells and whistles Office 365 offers.
Here’s what’s included in each Office 365 Business plan for small companies.
Office 365 Business Essentials
Looking to get basic Office 365 functionality? Office 365 Business Essentials offers business email with 50 GB mailbox storage, custom email domain and web versions of essential Office 365 applications like Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
Here’s what you need to know about the Business Essentials license:
Next is the Office 365 Business plan. Here are the price and specs for this license option:
The most expensive Business plan is Office 365 Business Premium. This license costs more than the Enterprise E1 option, so comparing the features is essential to choosing the right option.
Next, we take a look at the Office 365 Enterprise plans. As mentioned above, these are only available on a one-year commitment basis.
Office 365 Business plans are great for companies just starting out or that only require limited functionality. For organizations with 300+ users or those looking for a more robust solution, Office 365 Enterprise plans are available. With Enterprise plans, you can choose from Office 365 E5, E3 or E1 licenses.
E1 is the cheapest Enterprise plan (and actually costs less than the Business Premium license). Here’s what you get with the E1 license:
With E1, you can only access email via the online application.
With E1, you lose desktop versions of Office applications. You must use the online versions of Outlook and other Office applications like Word or PowerPoint online.
The E3 license is one of the more popular options for digital-driven businesses. You gain email, archiving, information protection and more storage options for only $5-$7.50 more per user per month than Business Premium.
Here’s what’s included in E3:
The Basics Price$20/user/month (annual commitment)Who It's For Businesses that need more advanced BI, compliance, email, security and voice capabilities.
What You'll Get Everything included in the Office E1 License Office Client Apps Legal compliance and archiving needs for email: archiving, eDiscovery hold and export, mailbox hold Information protection: message encryptions, rights management, data loss prevention Azure Rights Management and document management functions: archiving, rights management, data loss prevention and document-level encryption.Email storage for in-place archive Unlimited OneDrive storage eDiscovery legal hold eDiscovery export and case management Hosted voicemail support
The Office 365 Business Premium plan is most comparable to the Enterprise E3 plan in terms of base features.
Exchange Online Archiving (EOA) and Legal Hold
Unified eDiscovery Center
Rights management, data loss prevention and encryption
Ability to add on PSTN
Building off the E1 and E3 business plans, Office 365 E5 is the highest tier Microsoft offers. With this license, you gain:
The Basics Price$35/user/month (annual commitment)Who It's For If you use or plan to use Skype for Business Cloud PBX, we recommend the Office 365 E5 license. For $35/user/month, you gain a complete, consolidated phone system along with all functionality available within Office 365.
What You'll Get Everything included in E3 and E5 licenses Enhanced security features: Advanced ediscovery, secure attachments and URLs and access controls Microsoft’s Business Intelligence tools for end user organizational analytics Enterprise voice with Skype for Business (on-premises only)Skype for Business Cloud PBX Unlimited One Drive storage PSTN conferencing to dial in to Skype meetings from anywhere Cloud-based call management Advanced analytics with Power BI Pro and Microsoft My Analytics Advanced eDiscovery Advanced Data Governance Advanced security with Advanced Threat Protection and Customer Lock box Enhanced visibility and control of your Office 365 environment
Next, we look at Office 365 Enterprise Pro Plus. It is the last Enterprise plan offering.
Office 365 Enterprise Pro Plus offers a unique option for users who don’t need email access but require more advanced functionality than the Office 365 Business plan offers.
The Basics Price$12/user/month (annual commitment)Who It's For Users that rely heavily on Office 365 applications on mobile devices, do not need email access but require compliance and basic business intelligence.
What You'll Get File sharing and 1 TB One Drive online document storage Fully installed Office on PC/Mac Office apps on tablets and phones Self-service BI in Excel Office Online: Create, view and edit rights for online versions of core Office apps for collaborating on documents Sway for Office 365 eDiscovery search On-premises Active Directory sync for single sign-on Mobile device management
If any license doesn’t suit your needs, you can also add on specific features like Skype Cloud PBX. But often, the cost of upgrading is cheaper than ballooning a license with monthly add-on charges. (Read more about add-ons here .) You can also mix and match licenses depending on user needs to better control costs.
Agile IT’s cloud licensing services make it easy to purchase, transfer and manage your licenses. As your cloud solutions provider, Agile IT handles all billing and subscriptions for your Office 365 products. You continue paying Microsoft the monthly license fee, and we take care of the rest
Please contact to [email protected] if you need more information.
SPF record troubleshooting
Improve Email deliveribility
Hybrid deployment prerequisites
Office 365 is available in three distinct business plans, e1, e3 and e5. which is right for your organization.
Microsoft 365 is the market leader in cloud productivity suites for business, providing businesses with Microsoft Office applications, cloud storage, email, instant messaging, video conferencing, and more, all in one monthly subscription.
Office 365 is available in three plans: E1, E3, and E5. E1 is the most basic plan, offering essential business services like email, file sharing, and storage. E3 provides the full suite of enterprise functionality with Office applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) and additional security functionality. E5 is the most advanced package, with all the features of E3, alongside advanced email security functionality, analytics, and phone systems.
Commonly asked questions are: which plan offers the best value for money? Is it better value to use E3 and implement third-party email security? Do I need the additional security and analytics functionality offered in E5?
In this article, we’ll attempt to answer these questions and recommend which service is the best fit for your organization. We’ll start with a breakdown of each plan and what it has to offer. All pricing shown is the current information found on Microsoft’s pricing grid .
Before we get started, there’s one thing to be aware of: in this article, we’re just looking at Office 365’s pricing options. Microsoft recently renamed it’s enterprise productivity suite as a whole from Office 365 to Microsoft 365, but still advertizes Office 365 plans for SMBs. Microsoft 365 (a suite for large enterprise organizations of over 300 users) also offers E3 and E5 solutions, but these are more expensive and offer even more advanced security technologies, including identity and access management, and Microsoft’s Defender antivirus.
For the purposes of this article, we’re looking at the Office 365 packages on this page . These are aimed at small to mid-sized organizations and cover all Office 365 functionality outside of endpoint management and the Windows operating system.
E1: The best option if you’re looking for basic email and file sharing capabilities, and you absolutely do not need to use the Office 365 application suite. Best for a very small team of users.
E3: The best all-round option if you don’t need audio-conferencing or advanced compliance features. Includes the full Microsoft Office 365 suite and better storage for email and file sharing. We recommend using it alongside third-party email security , which is often more cost-effective than E5.
E5: The best option for businesses with more enterprise needs looking for telephone conferencing and additional compliance features. Additional security features are an important consideration, but third-party email security can be more powerful and cost-effective.
Let’s take a look at each of these plans in more detail.
Price: $10.00 Per User Per Month
The E1 package is the most basic of the three packages we’ll consider on this list and, as you would expect, the cheapest. It provides the “core” cloud business functionality, including email with Microsoft Outlook, file storage and sharing with OneDrive, and some security controls like multi-factor authentication.
We would recommend E1 only for businesses who do not wish to use Office cloud applications, but require basic email and file sharing functionality. The service is more cost-effective when considering this use case than E3.
However, when it comes to security—particularly email security—this solution is lacking. If you’re investing in E1, we recommend that you implement third-party email security solutions to protect your business against sophisticated phishing and ransomware attacks.
Price: $23.00 Per User A Month
Microsoft Office 365 E3 is the middle option for Office 365 users, including all the features of E1, with the full desktop suite of Office 365 applications and greater storage for email and SharePoint. Office 365 E3 can broadly be considered the “Goldilocks” plan: it’s not too basic and not too advanced.
The main missing features here are the enhanced email security functionality provided by Defender for Office 365, and audio-conferencing. There are numerous third-party email security solutions that provide more powerful email security than Defender (for a more cost-effective price), so the decision between E3 and E5 may come down to whether you need those audio-conferencing features.
E3 is a strong option for most small- and mid-sized businesses looking for Microsoft Office applications, emails, cloud-file management, and file sharing, with strong enterprise analytics and compliance controls. The service provides all the basic enterprise controls that most small businesses require, at an affordable price-point. However, there are two main areas where this solution is lacking.
The first is security. When it comes to protecting email, this solution only provides Exchange Online Protection (EOP), which filters email for malicious links, spam and basic phishing attacks. However, this level of protection is very limited, and will not protect your business against sophisticated email attacks such as social engineering (or “spear-phishing”) and ransomware. These attacks are increasingly common and should be a core consideration for your business when deciding which plan to invest in.
However, there are third-party email security solutions available that can offer a far higher level of protection than EOP and indeed Microsoft’s own email security solution, Defender for Office 365 (available on the E5 plan). These services can be more cost effective than the price difference between E3 and E5, and are often very easy to install. This is because they use the Microsoft Graph API, so users can be easily onboarded with no MX redirects or new configurations necessary.
You can read our guide to the Top Email Security Solutions for Office 365 here.
The second area in which Microsoft E3 is lacking is audio-conferencing and the phone system. Teams is included, but you can only use it to communicate with other Teams users, and not to make external phone calls. If you need to regularly make phone calls—to support a sales team for example—and prefer the convenience of using one solution for all your users, Microsoft E5 may be the better plan to go for. If this is not a consideration, or only small numbers of your employees need telephone functionality, E3 is a good all-rounder.
Price: $38.00 Per User A Month
Microsoft Office 365 E5 can be described as the “Premium” Office 365 option, providing the most advanced functionality for businesses. It’s more expensive, has more features, and is also split into two plans.For the purposes of this article, we’ll just be considering Plan 2.
The core differences between E3 and E5 are audio-conferencing features and security functionality. But there are also other benefits, including advanced analytics, compliance and information protection, and advanced retention policies for email. E5 is the best option if you want everything Office 365 has to offer—but it may not always represent the best value.
E5 provides the most features and functionality of the three plans, so from the perspective of getting the best possible version of Office 365, this plan is the way to go. It provides all the Office 365 applications, advanced email control and functionality, better auditing and analytics, and the telephone system and audio-conferencing capabilities.
So, the question for your business has to be: do you need those additional features and, if so, do they need to be part of Office 365?
As we’ve covered, there are numerous extremely powerful third-party solutions dedicated to providing organizations with email security and compliance functionality. This covers security, but also encryption and archiving—two of the other advanced features present in E5 but not E3. These solutions are often more cost-effective than E5 and will often have more extensive security features and reporting. In most cases, for example, we’d recommend that Office 365 E5 users implement a third-party email security solution to augment the security offered by Defender.
However, it is a clear benefit to have one system from which users can access all applications and services. It’s far easier to manage and can boost productivity. This is especially important with the phone system, and adding audio-conferencing to Teams makes it easy for users to make calls and speak to colleagues—especially remotely.
Our final recommendation is that, if you need a telephone system and audio-conferencing, E5 is the best plan. If you’re considering E5 just for the additional security functionality, we’d instead recommend that you invest in E3 and implement a third-party email security, archiving or encryption solution.
If you are looking to implement an email security solution for O365 as an alternative to the Office 365 E5 license, there are a number of solutions on the market. You can read our guide to the top email security solutions for Office 365 here.
Let’s wrap up by recapping our recommendations for each Office 365 plan:
E3: The best all-round option if you don’t need audio-conferencing or advanced compliance features. Includes the full Microsoft Office 365 suite and better storage for email and file sharing. We recommend using it alongside third-party email security, which is often more cost-effective than E5.
Finding the most relevant plan for your organization will come down to your unique business needs and use cases. If you don’t need a telephone system, using a combination of E3 with an additional layer of third-party security is the best option. If you do need a telephone system, E5 would be our recommendation.
If you’d like to take a look at the best email security systems for Office 365, we’ve put together a useful guide, which you can read here:
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As a set of online collaboration tools, Microsoft Office 365 delivers certain advantages over the offline version. Office 365 can be purchased with different subscription plans, which target organizations with varying requirements.
The subscription plans offered in Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise are E1, E3, and E5. Each of these three subscription plans has different functionality and security available at different price points. Thus, you may want to analyze your organization’s needs and budget to pick the plan providing the most value per dollar.
In this blog post, we look in detail at each of the three Office 365 Enterprise subscription plans and then provide you with an overview chart to assist with choosing the plan that best suits your organization’s needs.
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The Office 365 E1 suite is the lightest version among the three main Enterprise plans. This subscription is ideal for businesses that require basic email and file sharing functionality. With an E1 license, you get web versions of all Office applications, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, in conjunction with cloud services like OneDrive and Teams.
Note that with an E1 license, a single user can install Office mobile apps on up to 5 PCs/Mac + 5 tablets + 5 smartphone devices with screen sizes of 10.1″ or less. Users with bigger laptops and desktop computers can only access the Office 365 apps through a browser. And compared to their desktop versions, the web-based apps aren’t as feature-rich.
Here is a list of the features available with the E1 plan:
USD 8.00 per user/month | |
Office for the web | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote | |
Mailbox size: 50 GB, Calendar, Public folder mailboxes, Resource mailboxes, Microsoft Shifts | |
Microsoft Teams, Unlimited chat, Online meetings, Live Events, Webinars, Screen sharing and custom backgrounds, Record meetings, Priority notifications | |
OneDrive personal storage: 1 TB, SharePoint: Plan 1, Yammer Enterprise | |
Productivity Score, Secure Score, Compliance Management, Insights by MyAnalytics | |
Exchange Online Protection, Multi-Factor Authentication |
This plan provides the key business components required for modern collaboration with a focus on remote working. But due to E1’s rudimentary security measures, especially when it comes to email protection, it is highly recommended to adopt a third-party security solution to keep your data safe and protect your work environment from malicious threats.
All things considered, for USD 8.00 per user/month, the Office 365 E1 plan is a cost-effective solution for small enterprises who are looking for easy and quick remote solutions for their team.
Microsoft Office 365 E3 is the mid-tier plan for Office 365 users. E3 includes all the features of E1 in addition to the full desktop suite of Office 365 applications and greater cloud storage space.
The E3 subscription gives you access to the latest Office applications on up to 5 devices, plus 5 TB of OneDrive storage. Office 365 E3 is built for teams with enterprise-grade security and compliance, including the right blend of scalability, mobility, and collaboration. E3 is always connected with Skype for Business.
Office 365 E3 includes the following features:
USD 20.00 per user/month | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Access, and Publisher | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote | |
Mailbox size: 100 GB, Calendar, Public folder mailboxes, Resource mailboxes, Microsoft Shifts, Outlook desktop client, Inactive mailboxes, Microsoft Bookings | |
Microsoft Teams, Unlimited chat, Online meetings, Live Events, Webinars, Screen sharing and custom backgrounds, Record meetings, Priority notifications | |
OneDrive personal storage: 1 to 5 TB, SharePoint: Plan 2, Yammer Enterprise | |
Productivity Score, Secure Score, Compliance Management, Insights by MyAnalytics | |
Exchange Online Protection, Multi-Factor Authentication, Data loss prevention (DLP)* |
*The implementation of a DLP policy in your Office 365 environment helps prevent employees from inappropriately sharing sensitive information, such as credit card numbers, social security numbers, and financial records, with suspicious external sources.
With an E3 subscription, you can have full access to the newest versions of the Office 365 desktop and mobile apps at an affordable price. Your team members working from a remote location don’t need to be fully reliant on a secure internet connection to conduct daily tasks.
Microsoft Office 365 E5, the most expensive subscription in all Enterprise plans, offers businesses a fully-featured suite of Office applications. The E5 plan contains all major Microsoft 365 apps that support real-time collaboration, including professional email, online data storage, video conferencing, and audio conferencing tools.
One of the E5 plan’s crucial advantages is the implementation of robust security features through Microsoft Defender for Office 365. If you’re looking for an all-in-one, feature-packed Office solution for your organization, E5 may be your best option.
Office 365 E5 is the most feature-rich of all Enterprise plans and includes the following features:
USD 35.00 per user/month | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Access, and Publisher | |
Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote | |
Mailbox size: 100 GB, Calendar, Public folder mailboxes, Resource mailboxes, Microsoft Shifts, Outlook desktop client, Inactive mailboxes, Microsoft Bookings | |
Microsoft Teams, Unlimited chat, Online meetings, Live Events, Webinars, Screen sharing and custom backgrounds, Record meetings, Priority notifications, Phone System, Audio Conferencing | |
OneDrive personal storage: 1 to 5 TB, SharePoint: Plan 2, Yammer Enterprise | |
Productivity Score, Secure Score, Compliance Management, MyAnalytics (full), Power BI Pro | |
Exchange Online Protection + Data loss prevention (DLP), Multi-Factor Authentication, Cloud App Security Discovery, Apply sensitivity labels, Privileged Access Management, Communication compliance, Microsoft Defender for Office 365 |
E5 is the most comprehensive suite of the three plans in terms of features and functionality. For USD 35.00 per user/month, in addition to all the options found in E3, businesses can access Office 365’s telephone system and audio-conferencing tools and benefit from the advanced security features.
We put together a comparison chart to highlight the main differences between Office 365 E1, E3 and E5. This may help you choose the right plan for your organization. And since Office 365 is a subscription-based service you can easily upgrade (or downgrade) to a different plan.
Price | USD 8.00 per user/month | USD 20.00 per user/month | USD 35.00 per user/month |
Security | Exchange Online Protection, Multi-Factor Authentication | + Data loss prevention (DLP) | + Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Cloud App Security Discovery, Privileged Access Management, Communication compliance |
Office Apps | Word Online, Excel Online, PowerPoint Online, Outlook Online (PC Only) | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher (PC Only), Access (PC Only) | Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher (PC Only), Access (PC Only) |
Storage | Outlook: 50GB, OneDrive: 1 TB | Outlook: 100GB, OneDrive: 1–5 TB | Outlook: 100GB, OneDrive: 1–5 TB |
Services | Exchange, OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams, Yammer, Stream | Exchange, OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams, Yammer, Stream | Exchange, OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams, Yammer, Stream, Power BI |
To wrap up, here is a quick recap of the Office 365 options we covered in this blog post.
Office 365 E1 is Microsoft’s most basic Office package. However, with the cloud and web-based services that E1 offers, this entry-level plan is the most accessible. If your small business only requires basic email and file sharing functionality, E1 is the right plan for you.
E3 is a well-balanced plan designed for small to medium-sized businesses that require bigger storage space. E3 offers robust security, increased mailbox storage and includes the Office desktop suite. With the E3 subscription, your employees can stay productive regardless of the location or the device(s) in use.
And finally, Office 365 E5 is Microsoft’s premier offering for bigger enterprises. This comprehensive plan includes all the features of E1 and E3 combined with audio conferencing tools and advanced security and compliance features.
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Microsoft Office 365 comes in three different flavors for Enterprise: E1, E3, and E5. With each successive level, you get more features — but what is included, exactly?
The short table below gives you a quick overview.
In the rest of this article, I’ll give you an introduction to each of the three versions, a more detailed comparison table , some special considerations for different industries, and a video overview .
$10 USD | $23 USD | $38 USD | |
✓ | ✓✓ | ✓✓✓ | |
✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
X | ✓ | ✓ |
O365 E1 is the “lightest” version of the Enterprise-level plans. The features included in E1 are
Within the E1 license you also receive web versions of Office applications, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, and Publisher.
One thing to note is that the E1 plan does not allow installation of applications on devices — for instance, laptops, smartphones, or tablets — and therefore a constant, secure Internet connection is required to use this plan for your business.
E1 Pricing : Office 365 E1 licenses start at $10/user/month USD ($12.80 CAD). *
Though the E3 plan is slightly more expensive than the E1 tier, the added features justify the investment. Within the O365 E3 plan, each user gets the full license and is allowed to install the applications on up to 5 desktops, 5 tablets, AND 5 smartphones.
So your remote workers or team members working from home won’t be dependent on having a good, secure Internet connection 24/7. They can stay productive wherever they are and whichever device they are on.
The E3 plan includes everything mentioned in the E1 licenses along with some extras:
E3 also includes other data management functions like archiving, rights management, and document-level encryption, advanced emailing, access control for emails and documents, intelligent search and discovery features that allow you to easily pick up required content from Office applications, SharePoint, and Delve.
E3 Pricing : Office 365 E3 licenses cost $23/user/month USD ($30.60 CAD). *
O365 E5 is the super-powered version of Office and is available for a small increase in cost. In my opinion, the main addition to the E5 license is the fully loaded security features and some analytic tools and voice capabilities. You get everything included in E3 along with a few more benefits:
Other additions include Advance eDiscovery, access controls and control encryption key, Advanced Threat Protection, Threat Intelligence for proactive cybersecurity and actionable insight, O365 Cloud App Security, PTSN conferencing capabilities, Advanced Data Governance and Customer Lockbox.
E5 Pricing : Office 365 E5 licenses cost $38/user/month USD ($50.60 CAD). *
Overall, the biggest difference between Office 365 E1 and E3 is that E3 is better for remote workers. The biggest difference between E3 and E5 is that E5 has extra security and analytics.
Here’s a detailed breakdown of pricing and the key Office 365 features for each Enterprise plan:
Selecting the right Office 365 version is an important step. However, keep in mind that because these are subscription licenses, you are never locked in on the licenses you choose to start with. You can downgrade or upgrade, and you can also have a mix of different licenses for the different needs of the users in your company.
Based on my experience with many customers, there are also some special considerations in different industries:
Choosing the version of Office 365 Enterprise that’s right for you is pretty simple for most companies: If you want access to the Office applications on your own devices, even when you’re not connected to the Internet, then you need E3 or E5. And you only really need E5 if you need to have advanced security features, a Power BI Pro license, or the ability to make phone calls. If you still can’t decide, look at the “Security” row in the plan comparison table above and check out the various increases in functionality. There’s a little more to it than that (see the Office 365 page for more) but those are the basics.
If you have further questions, or if you’re ready to buy Office 365, contact us with the form below.
If you purchase Office 365 with Encore as a partner, you pay the same amount per license and you gain extra benefits:
* Based on the contract commitment, the per user per month price may differ from the price listed. All pricing is subject to change without notice. Contact Encore for the most current pricing.
† The Office 365 Business Plans were recently renamed to Microsoft 365 plans. However, the Office 365 Enterprise plans described in this article still have the same names.
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Ziad Paracha is the Practice Lead for Encore Business Solutions Partnership & Alliances team. As a visionary leader and technology enthusiast, Ziad believes that partnership relationships create meaningful impacts; and engages with businesses globally to create and implement strategies to establish mutually beneficial partnerships. Ziad champions in partner acquisition and retention, driving new sales opportunities, collaborative solution development and go-to-market initiatives. In his down time, you will find Ziad exploring the Rockies in Canada, adventuring across the seven continents with his family, or reading a captivating novel.
How to boost employee learning with lms365 freemium , how are upgrades different in dynamics 365.
Microsoft Office 365 is the most commonly used office suite in the world. Read more to learn about the unique features of each of the E1, E3, and E5 plans and choose the best option for your organization: Office 365 E1 Vs E3 Vs E5: Enterprise Plans Comparison
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Microsoft 365 E3 and Microsoft 365 E5 plans offer a huge range of benefits and services. Knowing the differences between the two plans makes it easier to decide which one is right for your organization. In this article, I will compare the Microsoft 365 E3 vs E5 plans so you can make the right decision on which is right for your organization.
Microsoft 365 , if not the most popular, is way up there in terms of productivity solutions for your organization. There are plans that serve smaller SMBs all the way up to 100,000+ employee enterprises. The solutions serve many vertical markets including healthcare, charities, commercial, etc., with specific subsets of plans – think Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare .
“Wait, wait…step back. What again IS Microsoft 365?” Originally branded Office 365 , it is an all-inclusive suite of diverse cloud applications and services that include Office 365 (apps), Windows 10 and Windows 11 , and Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) .
“We changed the name to be more reflective of the range of features and benefits in the subscription, to meet the unique needs of individuals and businesses.”
Microsoft 365 includes everything you know in Office 365. Microsoft 365 is designed to help people and businesses achieve more with innovative Office apps, intelligent cloud services, and world-class security.
The following Office 365 plans for enterprise  are still available:Â
Let’s start this off with an overview of the services offered in both Microsoft 365 E3 and E5 plans. This is an excellent starting point for you to get a glimpse from 30,000 ft of what features are available in each plan, and to gather information about the differences between the two and the associated cost differences.
The Microsoft 365 E3 plan combines best-in-class productivity apps with core security and compliance capabilities.
Here are most of the features, services, and applications included in the plan:
Besides all the services and applications offered in the plan, there are additional Add-on services you can purchase for a subset of your users. Here are a few examples:
The Microsoft 365 E5 plan combines best-in-class productivity apps found in the ‘E3’ plan but also includes advanced security, compliance, voice, and analytical capabilities.
All the benefits and services listed above in the ‘E3’ plan are included in this here ‘E5’ plan. Here are just some examples of the features unique to Microsoft 365 E5.
In addition, similar Add-on services are available on top of the already impressive suite of apps and services. Here are a few examples:
The published ‘street’ prices are as follows:
It probably goes without saying, but it doesn’t matter…I’m gonna say it – You can get discounted pricing when purchasing various enterprise or SMB agreements through Microsoft or through a value-added reseller (VAR). And, of course, your per-user cost of E5 as an example will be lower when purchasing 30,000 licenses, vs 300.
Microsoft 365 E3 and E5 are available through the Enterprise Agreement, Enterprise Agreement Subscription, and Microsoft Products and Services Agreement (MPSA) for commercial and government customers, and in the Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program for customers with cloud-only deployments.
Microsoft 365 also allows Enterprise Agreement (EA) customers to license in a true per-user licensing model, giving them a consistent productivity experience on any device and on any operating system. It also provides increased manageability and simplicity as you will no longer need to count devices for the Platform Enterprise Agreement and cloud services. You can move to the cloud without modifying your EA while eliminating the need for Bridge CALs and True-ups .
To help you understand what services are available in each plan, there are several options you have to determine what makes the most sense for your organization. Here are the high-level differences.
As long as you use supported Windows 10 and Windows 11 devices, you should have no problem using, for example, Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise. You’ll be fine using the numerous services and applications included in your Microsoft 365 service plan.
You can use desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones, and all-in-one computers for your organization.
As well as being able to purchase different Microsoft 365 service plans, there are security and compliance add-ons available to enhance your base licensing service options. The two core items are included in the E5 plan. For those customers that don’t want to or can’t take the plunge from E3 to E5, they can choose these:
Let’s look at the various security features included in the Enterprise Mobility & Security (EMS) suite. These include:
EMS provides an identity-driven security solution that offers a holistic approach to the security challenges in this mobile-first, cloud-first (Thank you, Satya ) era. The included suite of technologies not only helps you protect your organization but also identity breaches before they cause damage.
As an IT Pro, responsible for the management of a Microsoft 365 service plan, your new home page in your web browser will be the ‘Microsoft 365 admin center’.Â
You use the Microsoft 365 admin center  to set up your organization in the cloud, manage users, manage subscriptions, and much more. You can learn how to get to the admin center and learn about available features and settings.
Table 1 – The features and settings you’ll find in the left-hand navigation of the Microsoft 365 admin center
|
|
Home | This is the landing page in the admin center. You’ll see where to manage users, billing, service health, and reports. |
Users | Create and manage users in your organization, like employees or students. You can also set their permission level or reset their passwords. |
Groups | Create and manage groups in your organization, such as a Microsoft 365 group, distribution group, security group, or shared mailbox. Learn how to create and manage groups. |
Resources | Create and manage resources, like a SharePoint site collection. Learn how to create site collections. |
Billing | View, purchase, or cancel subscriptions for your organization. View past billing statements or view the number of assigned licenses to individual users. Learn how to manage billing. |
Support | View existing service requests or create new ones. Learn more in Contact support for business products – Admin Help. |
Settings | Manage global settings for apps like email, sites, and the Office suite. Change your password policy and expiration date. Add and update domain names like contoso.com. Change your organization profile and release preferences. And choose whether partners can access your admin center. |
Setup | Manage existing domains, turn on and manage multi-factor authentication, manage admin access, migrate user mailboxes to Office 365, manage feature updates, and help users install their Office apps. |
Reports | See at a glance how your organization is using Microsoft 365 with detailed reports on email use, Office activations, and more. Learn how to use the new activity reports. |
Health | View health at a glance. You can also check out more details and the health history. See How to check service health and how to check Windows release health for more information. |
Message center | Keep track of upcoming changes to features and services. Microsoft posts announcements here with the information that helps you plan for change and understand how it may affect users. |
Admin centers | Open separate admin centers for Exchange, Skype for Business, SharePoint, Yammer, and Azure AD. Each admin center includes all available settings for that service. |
Use Microsoft Information Governance (sometimes abbreviated to MIG) capabilities to govern your data for compliance or regulatory requirements.
To help you comply with advanced data governance, Microsoft has designed a workflow to guide you through an end-to-end process to plan and implement capabilities across Microsoft 365, including secure access, threat intelligence, information protection, sensitivity labels, and data governance. For more information, see Deploy information protection for data privacy regulations with Microsoft 365 .
Well, conditionally, yes. When your business changes or you need more features, you can upgrade plans. The easiest way to do this is to use the Upgrade tab in the admin center. However, using the Upgrade tab isn’t supported in all situations. In some cases, you might be able to change plans manually.
I would suggest you visit the Microsoft 365 ‘Upgrade’ plan site to determine if your environment and plan details will work.
You can also change Microsoft 365 plans manually .
There are a few avenues you can pursue to upgrade your plan. Here are a few examples:
What are the differences between Office 365 E1 vs E3? Below you will find the major differences to help you choose between the two enterprise versions. I added a comparison chart at the end of this article so you get a nice overview of the major differences.
If you want to compare all the Office 365 versions, make sure you check this article about all the business and enterprise versions.
The Office 365 E1 version is focused on the Online version only. So you get Word, Excel, Outlook, and Onenote, but only the web version of it. If you are a small company or doing only minor editing of Office documents, then the web version can be more then sufficient.
You can however use install the apps on mobile devices (Limited to devices with a 10.1″ screen or smaller).
The E3 version comes with a full license to install the desktop version of Word, Excel, Outlook, Onenote, and Publisher on your Windows computer or Mac. And also you can install the Office apps on your tablet or mobile phone.
So in short Office 365 E1 vs E3 from an application standpoint:
If we look into the standard services of Office 365, then there is almost no difference between the E1 and the E3 version. But there is a difference between the amount of storage that you get, for SharePoint, OneDrive, and Exchange Online.
Office 365 E1 comes with “only” 1TB cloud storage for your Onedrive for Business account. Each user gets 1 TB of personal storage. Which is more than enough in most cases. With E3 you get 1Tb by default and the ability to expand it to 5 Tb. With a call to Microsoft support, you can get 25 TB/user.
When we look at SharePoint then both plans get 1 TB storage initially, but with E3 you also get 10GB per user extra.
Another big difference is found in the Exchange Online (mailbox) storage. E1 plans only have 50Gb storage for their primary mailbox and 50Gb for the Online Archive. E3 on the other hand comes with 100Gb storage for the mailbox and up to 1.5Tb for the Online archive.
A big decision-maker if you are using Remote Desktop or Citrix environment. E1 doesn’t support activation on shared computers. A lot of enterprise companies are using Citrix, Remote Desktop, or Shared Computers, something that won’t work with E1. So if you are using Citrix or a Remote Desktop environment, or if you have kiosk computers, then you should definitely go for Office 365 E3.
With Office 365 E3 you get the ability to place a user’s mailbox or a subset of his mailbox on hold for legal review. This way you can prevent items from being deleted to review them later. This is something that you think you don’t need until you get your first lawsuit. Only then you will understand the power of this future.
more information on In-place Hold and Litigation Holder
DLP policies allow you to comply with the business standard and industry regulations to protect sensitive information and prevent leaking outside the organization. With DLP you can identify and protect sensitive information in Exchange Online (mail), SharePoint and Onedrive for Business. DLP is not available in Office 365 E1.
Office 365 E1 is really cheap compared to the E3 version. It costs around $ 10.00 per user/month , the E3 version cost $ 23.00 per month .
So I hope that the explanation above helps you select the right version for your organization. If you have any questions, please let me know. If you need help setting up your Office 365 tenant, you can always reach me through LinkedIn or Twitter.
You can find more information or check the prices in your current here at Office 365
Annual commitment | $10.00 | $23.00 | |||||||||||
Monthly commitment | |||||||||||||
Core Details | |||||||||||||
Maximum users | Unlimited | Unlimited | |||||||||||
Office 365 E1 | Office 365 E3 | ||||||||||||
Office Online | |||||||||||||
Desktop Apps (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote) | |||||||||||||
Publisher and Access (pc only) | |||||||||||||
Mobile apps | |||||||||||||
Install apps on up to 5 PCs/Mac + 5 tablets + 5 smartphones | |||||||||||||
Microsoft Editor premium features | |||||||||||||
Notes: 1. Limited to devices with a 10.1″ screen or smaller 2. Mobile app only 3. Read only | |||||||||||||
Office 365 E1 | Office 365 E3 | ||||||||||||
Exchange (Email) | Plan 1 | Plan 2 | |||||||||||
Email archiving | | | |||||||||||
Public folder & Resource mailbox | |||||||||||||
Microsoft Shifts | |||||||||||||
Microsoft Bookings | |||||||||||||
Chat, Meetings, Social, and Calling | |||||||||||||
Microsoft Teams | |||||||||||||
Live Events | |||||||||||||
Yammer | > | ||||||||||||
Phone System & Audio Conferencing | |||||||||||||
Storage | |||||||||||||
OneDrive Storage (per user) | 1 TB | 5 TB | |||||||||||
SharePoint | Plan 1 | Plan 2 | |||||||||||
Notes: 1. 5 TB initial, contact Microsoft to increase. Less then 5 users, then only 1 TB per user 2. 1 TB Storage + 10Gb per user 3. 1 TB Storage | |||||||||||||
Project and task management | |||||||||||||
Planner | |||||||||||||
To-Do | |||||||||||||
Automation | |||||||||||||
Power Automate, Power Apps | |||||||||||||
Analytics | Office 365 E1 | Office 365 E3 | |||||||||||
MyAnalytics | |||||||||||||
PowerBi Pro | |||||||||||||
Endpoint and app management | |||||||||||||
Group Policy Support | |||||||||||||
Shared Computer Activation | |||||||||||||
Identity and access management | Office 365 E1 | Office 365 E3 | |||||||||||
AD Sync for SSO | |||||||||||||
Information Protection and Governance | |||||||||||||
Azure Information Protection | AIP for Office 365 | ||||||||||||
Manual sensitivity labels | |||||||||||||
Office 365 Data Loss Prevention (DLP) | |||||||||||||
Basic Office Message Encryption | |||||||||||||
eDiscovery and auditing | Office 365 E1 | Office 365 E3 | |||||||||||
Content Search, Basic Audit | |||||||||||||
eDiscovery | |||||||||||||
Litigation Hold | |||||||||||||
Windows | |||||||||||||
9 thoughts on “office 365 e1 vs e3”.
E1 also includes 50GB of email in Exchange Online, while E3 and E5 allows 100GB. Might be a factor for some
Thanks, I finally updated the article..
According to this: https://www.microsoft.com/nl-be/microsoft-365/business/office-365-enterprise-e1-business-software?activetab=pivot:overviewtab mobile apps ARE included in the E1 license.
You are correct, I will update the article with the correct information. Thanks for letting me know!
It looks as if you forgot to update that. Still no checkbox next to “Office apps on tablets and phones” for E1. Also note that you should clarify that its any device below 10.1″, as an iPad Pro would need an E3 license still. See note about that on the link below: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/microsoft-announces-mobile-editing-availability-for-more-subscribers-be2cc9ae-113a-417f-8d34-b445ea49658a
Hi How Microsoft approaches the license (O365 E3) of the mailbox from which the mail is sent. We have multifunctional devices (document scanners) and in its configuration the mail server address and e-mail address is entered, e.g. [email protected] . It is similar in ERP system. System sends different messages to employees’ mailboxes. Do you need to buy an O365 license for such object ?
No that is not necessary. You can just the Office 365 SMTP server for the scanner and use enter the from address in the scanner self. For more info, check this article
What about E5
You can check out these articles:
Office 365 E3 vs E5 – What are the important differences? Office 365 Comparison chart – Business Plans vs F1, E1, E3 and E5
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Errin oconnor.
One of the crucial decisions you’ll have to make before migrating over to the cloud is selecting the right Office 365 license type for your organization. The challenge is how to tell which Office 365 plan will be the most suitable for your business. Nonetheless, since Office 365 solutions are subscription-based licenses, your organization is not forever locked in on any license you opt for.
Let us find out the most suitable plan for your business by starting with the comparisons.
You have the absolute freedom to change your license depending on your needs. This means you can mix and match, upgrade or downgrade your licenses based on your organization’s needs and goals. Below are the key features and benefits of Business and Enterprise Plans to help you make the right decision.
Here’s how Microsoft Office Business Plans compare to Enterprise Plans:
Microsoft Office 365 Business plans are designed specifically for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs). When organizations that fit this description move to the cloud, they lower their overall capital expenditure, increase collaboration, and enhance productivity as well. Office 365 Business Plans allow SMBs to set up teams that communicate seamlessly while on the go, create, and complete tasks, and manage employees productively.
More so, the various Office 365 license types allow organizations to manage their information by setting appropriate rules and guidelines. Business Plans also allow SMBs to boost collaboration by using several user-friendly Office 365 applications. Office 365 Business Plans include Office 365 Business Essential Suite, Office 365 Business Suite, and Office 365 Premium Suite.
Office 365 Essentials Suite is great for connecting work-groups or teams in an organization with the help of Microsoft Teams. It also allows users to create custom email domain address as well as using the web versions of various Office applications. These Office applications include OneNote, Excel, Word, Outlook, and PowerPoint.
In addition, this Office 365 license type allows users to host web-based meetings and video conferencing with up to 250 participants. Office 365 Essentials Suite currently supports Windows 7 Service Pack 1, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10. It also supports two current versions of macOS such as Mojave and Catalina. In addition, Essentials allows users to host emails with a 50GB mailbox and 1TB of OneDrive cloud storage. Office 365 Business Essentials price goes for $5 per user per/month for an annual commitment. You can also opt for a monthly commitment of $6 per user/month.
Business Suite is good for organizations that need Office applications as well as cloud-based file storage and sharing facility. This Office 365 license type allows users to enjoy the benefits of having desktop versions of Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, OneNote, and Excel. In addition, organizations get the chance to use Office apps on up to five smartphones, five tablets, and five computers or Mac per user.
All apps are automatically updated by Microsoft every month. Business Suite users have access to 1TB of OneDrive cloud storage and online access to fully-installed office applications. It also supports Windows 10, 8.1 and 7 as well as two recent macOS such as Mojave and Catalina. Office 365 Business price goes for $8.25 per user/month for an annual commitment. You can also opt for $10 per user/month for a monthly commitment.
The Office 365 Business Premium Suite is a great solution for organizations that require business-class email, Office applications, and other crucial business communication and productivity solutions. This plan is suitable for bigger businesses with more than 150 employees and which considers customer relations as very crucial.
This Office 365 license type comes with all Office applications completely installed. Interestingly, one Office 365 Business Premium Suite license covers as many as 5 devices. In addition, it supports email hosting which includes 50GB mailbox as well as custom email address tailored to your domain. More so, the Business Premium Suite has secure file storage and 1TB of OneDrive storage. You can get the Office 365 Business Premium at $12.50 per user/month for an annual commitment or choose the monthly commitment option of $15 per user/month.
Microsoft also adds some additional tools and solutions with the Office 365 Business Premium plan. One of such is The Outlook Customer manager which automatically collects all your customer communications, notes, bookings, tasks, and combines them in a convenient list that is available on the side of your outlook. Also, Business Premium users are given access to Microsoft MileIQ, Invoicing, and Booking. All these are great solutions designed to simplify managing customer relations.
The various Office 365 Enterprise plans are designed to meet the needs of large-scale organizations. Enterprise Plans are designed with great email and seamless communication solutions to simplify online collaboration. Organizations with a large employee strength often run into complex situations while making efforts to manage their employees in a productive way. This Office 365 license type plans are designed with high-performing business solutions to help enterprises with their external and internal communication requirements. Interestingly, all Office 365 Enterprise solutions offer unlimited user access.
Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise Plans are offered in different packages. These include the E1, E3, and E5. Each package offers more solutions than the previous one. But which of them should you opt for and why? A closer look at the various features and benefits of each plan will make it easier for you to choose the most appropriate plan for your organization.
Microsoft Office 365 E1 is considered as the least among the Enterprise level solutions. Microsoft Office 365 E1 services and applications include StaffHub and Planner to oversee daily staff tasks, Communication and team sites with SharePoint, MS Stream, Email and Calendars through Microsoft Exchange, Delve for content discovery, Enterprise social with Yammer, Teams (with features and components of Skype for Business), as well as OneDrive for Business with 1TB cloud storage.
In addition, this Office 365 license type offers the web versions of various Office applications. These include Outlook, Publisher, Word, Excel, OneNote, and PowerPoint. It is worth mentioning that the E1 license does not allow users to install applications on mobile devices like tablets and smartphones. This means the E1 requires an internet connection for users to access the various available solutions.
While the Microsoft Office E3 plan is priced higher compared to the E1, the additional features and solutions account for the price. For example, the Microsoft Office E3 plan offers each user a complete license and allows them to install various applications on several devices. These include five smartphones, five desktops, and five tablets. This means you can work and collaborate seamlessly anytime and from anywhere. This is one easy way to boost your organization’s productivity while enhancing workflow.
This Office 365 license type offers all the solutions listed in the E1 license and more. The additional benefits are:
MS Office Suite: This means Microsoft Office E3 users will always have access to the most current version of several Microsoft solutions. These include OneDrive for Business, Publisher, OneNote, Word, Access, Excel, Teams, PowerPoint, and Outlook.
Cross-Platform Installation: Microsoft Office E3 users can download and install Office applications across various operating systems (OS) and devices. These include tablets, smartphones, Mac, Android, and Windows.
Cloud Storage: Microsoft Office E3 offers users 1TB of storage by default along with the option to upgrade that to 5TB or even 25TB as needed.
Data Loss Prevention (DLP): DLP makes it possible for organizations to adhere to business standards, industry regulations concerning the protection of sensitive data, and the prevention of data leaks outside an organization. DLP is not part of the Microsoft E1 solution.
In addition, this Office 365 license type provides other data management solutions such as rights management, advanced emailing, SharePoint, archiving, Delve, access control for documents and emails, smart search and discovery features that make it easier for users to find needed content from Office applications, as well as document-level encryption.
Microsoft Office E5 is the ultimate version of Office Enterprise and it’s more expensive than Office E1 and E3. The Office E5 solution offers voice capabilities, analytic tools, and advanced security features along with all the benefits of Microsoft Office E3. This means all the services and solutions offered in this Microsoft Office 365 license type are available in E5 and more. The following are the additional benefits of Office E5:
Analytics Tools: Microsoft Office E5 is the only Enterprise solution that renders analytics tools like PowerBI Pro and MyAnalytics for data analysis, projection, and visualization.
Advanced Security and Information Protection: Microsoft Office E5 plan is designed with features to safeguard your data against threats such as zero-day malware and phishing. This means E5 users are fully protected from malware in links and attachments. In addition, DLP guarantees the safety of E5 users’ content.
Other add-ons available on this solution are Advance eDiscovery, Advanced Threat Protection, Office 365 Cloud App Security, Advanced Data Governance, Customer Lockbox, access controls and control encryption key, PSTN conferencing capabilities, as well as Threat Intelligence for actionable insights and proactive cybersecurity.
Choosing the right Office 365 license type for your organization isn’t as complicated as you might have assumed. If you’d like to have access to the Office applications on your personal computer without bothering about editing documents on your browser, choose E3 or E5.
If you need a Power BI Pro license or you’re interested in the voice calling capabilities , then choose the E5 version. However, if you still can’t figure out the best plan for our organization, you should reach out to us and we will gladly help.
As a benefit of being an EPC Group client, we provide our clients with a discount on their Microsoft Licensing and assist in selecting the right licenses for the specific organizational needs.
With over 25 years of experience in Information Technology and Management Consulting, Errin O’Connor has led hundreds of large-scale enterprise implementations from Business Intelligence, Power BI, Office 365, SharePoint, Exchange, IT Security, Azure and Hybrid Cloud efforts for over 165 Fortune 500 companies.
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Mar 10, 2021 2:24:00 PM
Last month we wrote a detailed post about the different update channels to choose from for Microsoft 365 (Office 365 ProPlus) based on your organization's needs, as well as the name changes that have occurred in the products over the last year. Now we are updating this post about the different plan options that Microsoft has for enterprises. We will be discussing Office 365 E1, E3, and E5, Microsoft Apps for enterprise, and Microsoft 365 E3, E5, F1, and F3. From pricing to productivity to security, each plan offers a deeper or more shallow dive into the Microsoft ecosystem.
What's important to remember, as we discussed in our earlier post and which Microsoft discusses here and here , is that while the naming conventions changed, the functionality didn't change. The Office 365 apps are still at the core of the offerings, but Microsoft 365 is a more encompassing Microsoft bundle which also includes products like Enterprise Mobility + Security (EM+S) tools and Windows 10 licenses.
This post outlines the plans and features of Microsoft 365 and Office 365 and the differences between the two service families. It also highlights why Microsoft made the changes and updates (such as replacing Office 365 ProPlus with Microsoft 365 Apps for Enterprise) and what the changes mean for large enterprises.
Office 365 Apps enable you to create, collaborate, and share from anywhere on devices with a cloud-based suite of apps and services. It includes the following plans :
Office 365 E1, the lowest priced offering, costs $8 per user per month and does not include the desktop Office apps, but rather the web versions of the core Office apps. Its business services include email, file storage and sharing, intranet capability, meetings and IM, and five layers of security and monitoring.
The E1 plan, with its integrations with Teams and OneDrive and web versions of Office apps, allows productivity from anywhere. For full details and requirements, see Microsoft's overview page.
This version is the go-to base version for productivity for the enterprise employee. It contains the enterprise editions of the Microsoft Office apps with cloud-based file storage and sharing. At $12 per user per month, it packs a lot of features. However, it does not support business email. Other features included are:
It's the best budget-friendly plan if your business relies on webmail or has a preferred email client. However, it lacks an intranet, a video portal, corporate social networking, and advanced security capabilities. For full details, see Microsoft's overview detail page.
The E3 plan contains all the features of E1 and Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise, and costs $20 per user per month. It can be installed on up to five PCs or Macs, plus five tablets and five phones per user. The E3 plan has additional security and compliance, such as:
This plan offers more robust security and control features on top of productivity. For a full list of features, please see Microsoft's E3 overview page .
The E5 plan has all of the E3 features, plus even more advanced security, analytics, voice capabilities, and compliance features, and costs $35 per user per month. This plan allows you to:
The E5 plan is the most robust in the Office 365 plan series, offering a high level of protection, compliance, and productivity. For a complete list of its offerings, please see the E5 page from Microsoft.
The F3 plan is the entry level plan for frontline workers in the field. Priced at $4 per user per month, it includes the web and mobile version of Office, 2GB of OneDrive storage per user, Microsoft Teams, business class email, security and monitoring.
The F3 plan empowers your frontline workforce with reliable productivity tools, and with its low price tag, allows an enterprise to offer it to all workers and ramp up fast. For full details, see Microsoft's F3 page .
Connect and empower every employee with Microsoft 365 solutions that enhance productivity and drive innovation at the enterprise level. With advanced device management, increased security, and innovative online services, the Microsoft 365 plans are a more robust choice for enterprises.
The plan includes the best-in-class apps with core security and compliance capabilities. It costs $32 per user per month and is comparable to the Office 365 E3 plan . However, the Microsoft 365 E3 plan adds threat protection, namely Windows Defender Application Guard, Device Guard, and antivirus, plus Microsoft threat analytics.
On top of the always up-to-date Office apps, also included is Windows 10 Enterprise, Microsoft Intune, Autopilot, etc. This bundle of services combines Microsoft's top productivity offerings in an Evergreen IT environment with advanced security and management.
This plan is designed for enterprises that are already using or are migrating to using multiple Microsoft services where they can bundle licenses to save costs, and manage their IT estate more effectively. For a full list of features, see the Microsoft 365 E3 page .
At $57 per user per month, this is the top tier of plans, which includes all the Microsoft 365 E3 features as well as PowerBI pro, audio calls and phone system integration. It also includes security features such as Microsoft 365 Defender (For Endpoint, Office 365, & Identity), Azure Active Directory Premium plan 2, and Cloud App Security. Another feature is advanced compliance, with Customer Lockbox, Advanced Data Governance, Advanced eDiscovery, etc.
This is the plan for enterprises that want to have the best in productivity, security, and compliance in an always up-to-date Evergreen IT environment, to have efficient and productive employees, and to focus on digital innovation. For full details on the E5 plan, please see Microsoft's overview page .
Like the Office 365 F3 plan, the Microsoft 365 F1 & F3 plans are designed for the frontline workforce as opposed to the office worker. These plans both provide the Office apps and secure communication to get the job done. The F3 plan takes things further to increase productivity and collaboration. The F1 plan costs $4 per user per month, and the F3 plan costs $10 per user per month.
Some of the additional features of the F3 plan are Microsoft Defender, BitLocker, Credential Guard, SCCM, Windows 10 Enterprise, etc.
The Office 365 and Microsoft Apps for Enterprise plans are made for organizations that want to provide their employees with the productivity tools they need — tools that are always up-to-date with the latest security and features. Since Office 365 doesn't include Windows 10, companies not ready to migrate to Windows 10 should choose this option. Also, companies that are heavily invested in proprietary or non Microsoft vendors for security and compliance might not be ready to shift to Microsoft for those needs yet.
The Microsoft 365 E3 and E5 plans are for the enterprises that want not only the productivity tools of the Office suite, but the most advanced security, compliance, device and user management possible. This option relies heavily on Microsoft, and in an Evergreen IT environment, makes updates and migrations within Microsoft products an almost painless process.
For the full comparison of features between the Office 365 and Microsoft 365 models, please see this PDF and this article from Microsoft.
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We are looking at various plans, but I am only able to see a comparison of the "Business" plans and the "Enterprise" plans compared against others in their environment. What is the distinction between the two plans, as they both seem to offer similar solutions.
Windows 365 Enterprise A Microsoft cloud operating system. 351 questions Sign in to follow Follow
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I am after the same information as Garry and I don't think the first link in the below answer gives the full picture. As Garry says the comparison between products in the same family seems to be good e.g. - https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365/business/compare-all-microsoft-365-business-products-b?&ef_id=Cj0KCQjw2cWgBhDYARIsALggUho_5FMef0o5BjJhKAGUhgFeGEu8BRLjPT0fAt05HsyaOExK7RfLVA0aAtCGEALw_wcB:G:s&OCID=AIDcmmwf9kwzdj_SEM_Cj0KCQjw2cWgBhDYARIsALggUho_5FMef0o5BjJhKAGUhgFeGEu8BRLjPT0fAt05HsyaOExK7RfLVA0aAtCGEALw_wcB:G:s&lnkd=Google_O365SMB_Brand&gclid=Cj0KCQjw2cWgBhDYARIsALggUho_5FMef0o5BjJhKAGUhgFeGEu8BRLjPT0fAt05HsyaOExK7RfLVA0aAtCGEALw_wcB
But I want to compare Office 365 E3 and Business Premium on the same page and with the same features compared. So for example, on the business premium page above there is a row called "Host webinars that include attendee registration pages, email confirmations, and reporting" - I want to know if Office 365 E3 has this ?
@Garry Thanks for posting in our Q&A. For this issue, it is not related to windows 365. It is related to Microsoft 365.
For this issue, I have done a lot of research. I find that this article compare something between Microsoft 365 Business Premium and Microsoft 365 E3/E5 in the official article. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/office-365-platform-service-description/office-365-plan-options#service-availability-within-each-microsoft-365-and-office-365-plan
With the limitation resource, if you want to get more accurate help, it is suggested to refer to the following link to get support: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/business-video/get-help-support?view=o365-worldwide
Hope it will help.
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There are multiple layers of customer controls for each organization to set exclusive security within Office 365. This includes essential security aspects such as safe access to Office 365 consulting services for multi-factor authentication and role-based access control (RBAC) for end-users, data loss prevention (DLP) features, message encryption.
Intelligence and analytics is a key point for many organizations to choose Office 365 business essentials or premium It makes your work culture easier by live data monitoring and helps in making use of updated spreadsheet tools, dashboards, reports and data visualization to discover new stories in your data.
Microsoft Office E1 is the basic version of Enterprises. This application includes some familiar office tools which offer 1TB of cloud storage per customer in OneDrive for business. The users can store the files in OneDrive, also it can be easily shared with anyone and from any location. It can be used offline by synchronizing with desktops and laptops. This helps the teams in the organization to work faster.
The drawback of using Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 is, the application can’t be installed on mobile devices like Smartphones and Tablets. To the experience-rich version of Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 is by upgrading your office to 2013 and for Mac Office 2011. Microsoft Enterprise E1 empowers your teams and helps you experience the best services you want and managing your team becomes easier by moving to the cloud.
Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E3 is the improved version of Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1. This is comparatively costly when compared to Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 because of its improved features. Microsoft Office 365 E3 is user-friendly can be used anywhere and anytime which makes your work easier. Its compliance request is simplified and has upgraded data protection which helps in keeping your data safe.
Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E3 helps in reducing IT investments because it gives you control over your task and automated by moving them to the cloud. This also gives you full license authority to each user. The common concern which is raised by the users is “Will my data be safe, even after canceling the subscription?” this is an important thing to be noted because security plays a major role in each and every organization.
The answer would be the data saved is always yours even if you cancel the subscription. You have an option of downloading your data and can be saved to another location. You should note that this process should take place before canceling the subscription because after canceling, the data stored in Office 365 will be available to your owner with limited access for 90 days.
Microsoft Office 365 E5 is the advanced version when compared to Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 and E3. The cost price of this version is slightly high. This version is completely built for teams and connecting networks. You can collaborate your infrastructure with one platform for calling, conferencing, video and sharing.
The important feature of Microsoft office 365 Enterprise E5 is a high security, where you can have control with increased privacy and transparency. Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1, E3 and E5 gives you an option to experience its features for free as a trial version. The users can use this free trial and can come to the conclusion of choosing this application.
Now there is a question raised “Post free trial while moving to subscription package can the information stored in a trial can be transferred to subscription account?” The answer is “Yes” the information stored will remain intact when you purchase Office 365 with the same user account used in the trial version. Also, you will get an option of 30 days’ time to purchase and view Office 365 plans and pricing. The data gets deleted if the subscription is not made within that 30 days.
Now we are going to discuss the features which are included in Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 vs Office 365 E3 vs office 365 E5 features and comparisons
1 | Office on tablets and phones | Yes | Yes | Yes |
2 | Email and calendars | Yes | Yes | Yes |
3 | Online Meetings | Yes | Yes | Yes |
4 | Meeting Broadcast | Yes | Yes | Yes |
5 | Instant messaging and Skype connectivity | Yes | Yes | Yes |
6 | Hub for teamwork | Yes | Yes | Yes |
7 | File storage and sharing | Yes | Yes | Yes |
8 | Intranet and team sites | Yes | Yes | Yes |
9 | Corporate social network | Yes | Yes | Yes |
10 | Office Online | Yes | Yes | Yes |
11 | Work management | Yes | Yes | Yes |
12 | Professional digital storytelling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
13 | Intelligent search and discovery | Yes | Yes | Yes |
14 | Enterprise video service | Yes | Yes | Yes |
15 | Apps for Office and SharePoint | Yes | Yes | Yes |
16 | Communication and work management | Yes | Yes | Yes |
17 | Workflow automation | Yes | Yes | Yes |
18 | Web and mobile app development | Yes | Yes | Yes |
19 | Audio Conferencing | Yes | Yes | Yes |
20 | Modern voice with Phone System | Yes | Yes | Yes |
21 | Multi-Geo Capabilities in Office 365 | Yes | Yes | Yes |
22 | Reliability | Yes | Yes | Yes |
23 | Security | Yes | Yes | Yes |
24 | Privacy | Yes | Yes | Yes |
25 | Administration | Yes | Yes | Yes |
26 | Up to date | Yes | Yes | Yes |
27 | Active Directory integration | Yes | Yes | Yes |
28 | Support | Yes | Yes | Yes |
29 | Office suite | – | Yes | Yes |
30 | Advanced Microsoft office 365 email | – | Yes | Yes |
31 | Document and email access control | – | Yes | Yes |
32 | Message Encryption | – | Yes | Yes |
33 | Mobility | – | Yes | Yes |
34 | Enterprise management of apps | – | Yes | Yes |
35 | Voicemail integration (Unified Messaging) | – | Yes | Yes |
36 | Advanced compliance tools | – | Yes | – |
37 | Information protection | – | Yes | – |
38 | Self-service Business Intelligence in Excel | – | Yes | – |
39 | Advanced information protection | – | – | Yes |
40 | Threat intelligence | – | – | Yes |
41 | Advanced security | – | – | Yes |
42 | Analytics tools | – | – | Yes |
43 | Intelligent compliance solutions | – | – | Yes |
44 | Customer Key | – | – | Yes |
This feature helps you to work on any device, from anywhere using fully installed Office experience across iOS®, Android™ and Windows phones, and tablets. One can install Office mobile apps on 5 tablets and 5 mobile phones
One of the important online services is Microsoft office 365 email and Calendars. One can experience business-class emails through Outlook and can be accessed from a desktop or from any browser. The mailbox comes with a memory of 50 GB and you can attach a document up to 150 MB.
Meetings become easier with a single touch on Smartphones, tablets or PC. One can conduct a meeting online with Audio, HD Video and Web conferencing by connecting to the internet.
One can broadcast meetings online and can be viewed/attended by up to 10,000 viewers from anywhere on any device or connecting with a web browser.
Skype for Business helps you to monitor the end-user by knowing their availability status. You can easily communicate with people using messaging, Voice calls and Video calls.
Hub for Teamwork is an option present in Office 365, where you can connect with your teams by chat, content, people, and tools. This helps your team to have instant access to all business requirements. You can also schedule a plan, assign tasks and connect with organizational apps and resources.
Each user is given 1 TB of cloud storage by OneDrive for Business, it can be operated from any location and from any device. You can also share the documents with people inside and outside the enterprise and comes with a feature of notifying, who has viewed and edited the document.
Enterprise can be informed and engaged, also people can be connected with team sites by content, expertise and process.
Social network helps in connecting people and to share information across the organization in a faster way. The two software which helps to perform its function is Yammer collaboration software and business applications.
Office online helps in creating and editing Word, OneNote, PowerPoint and Excel documents from a Web browser.
You can create new plans, organize a task to your team, assign work, share files, chat and get updates from the team regarding the progress using Planner.
Sway App from Office 365 can be used to perform this function. You can create engaging, fascinating and interactive web-based reports, presentations, etc., using your phone, tablet and web-browser, and more….
So, I hope that the explanation of the Office 365 enterprise could help you to select the right version for your company. If your organization need any help for setting up Office 365 tenant, You can always reach us to buy office 365 !!
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Subscriptions for fewer than five Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 users receive 1 TB of OneDrive storage that cannot be expanded. Microsoft 365 F3 plans include 2 GB of OneDrive storage per user. Storage allocations in Education tenants may be limited. Please see Office 365 Education service description for details.
Create, share, and collaborate from anywhere on any device with Office 365, a cloud-based suite of productivity apps such as Outlook, Word, and Excel.
Confused between choosing Office 365 plans? Enterprise or Business licenses? Enterprise E1 vs E3 vs E5 or Business plans: Essentials, Premium, or ProPlus. This comparison helps you to make the correct choice.
Confused about Office 365 licensing options? This comprehensive comparison covers Business Plans, E5, E3, and E1 to help you choose the right fit for your organization. Explore prices, features, and differences to make an informed decision.
Select the Microsoft 365 plan that's right for your home or business.
Office 365 License Comparison: Business Plans Vs. E5, E3 and E1 Choosing an Office 365 license is a critical step before migrating to the cloud. With multiple options for small, medium and enterprise businesses, navigating the differences can get overwhelming.
Office 365 is available in three plans: E1, E3, and E5. E1 is the most basic plan, offering essential business services like email, file sharing, and storage. E3 provides the full suite of enterprise functionality with Office applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) and additional security functionality.
Microsoft Office 365 is available in three plans: E1, E3, and E5. Find out which one is the best for your organization in our plan review and comparison article.
In this article we will dive deep into the Office 365 E5 plan and how it compares to the E3 plan, what are the biggest differences and of course a comparison chart of Office 365 E3 vs E5 at the end with all the import details next to each other.
There are a couple of trails available, Microsoft 365 Business Standard and Premium and Office 365 Enterprise E3 and E5. If you have a small company, with less than 50 employees I recommend starting with a Microsoft 365 Business Premium trial.
Office 365 comes in three different flavors for Enterprise: E1, E3, and E5. With each level, you get more features — but what is included, exactly?
Microsoft Office 365 is the most commonly used office suite in the world. Read more to learn about the unique features of each of the E1, E3, and E5 plans and choose the best option for your organization: Office 365 E1 V…
Compare Office 365 and Microsoft 365 for enterprise Get best-in-class productivity apps with Office 365 or upgrade to additional security and compliance capabilities with Microsoft 365.
Learn the differences between Microsoft 365 E3 and E5 plans to make it easier to decide which one is right for your organization. Both plans offer a huge range of benefits and services, and in ...
What are the differences between Office 365 E1 vs E3? Below you will find the major differences to help you choose between the two enterprise versions. I added a comparison chart at the end of this article so you get a nice overview of the major differences.
Office 365 E3 plan is slightly more expensive than the E1 plan, but it overcomes the limitations of the E1 plan. In E3 each user gets the full license of Office 365 and is allowed to install it on ...
Office 365 License Comparison: Business Plans vs. E5, E3, and E1 You have the absolute freedom to change your license depending on your needs. This means you can mix and match, upgrade or downgrade your licenses based on your organization's needs and goals.
Microsoft Office 365 is the most commonly used office suite in the world. Read more to learn about the unique features of each of the E1…
Are you looking to adopt Office 365 in your enterprise but you are wondering which plan to choose? We compared the Office 365 E1, E3, and the new E5.
Explore, Office 365 E5, a cloud-based suite of Microsoft Office productivity apps, upgraded from E3, Get advanced compliance, data visualizations, and voice capabilities.
Differences between M365 Business Premium and Enterprise E3 with E5 security add-on? We are looking at various plans, but I am only able to see a comparison of the "Business" plans and the "Enterprise" plans compared against others in their environment. What is the distinction between the two plans, as they both seem to offer similar solutions.
Microsoft Office 365 E5 is the advanced version when compared to Microsoft Office 365 Enterprise E1 and E3. The cost price of this version is slightly high. This version is completely built for teams and connecting networks. You can collaborate your infrastructure with one platform for calling, conferencing, video and sharing.