G suite vs. Office 365…which one is the best choice for startups and small businesses? If you’re here, chances are you might be trying to decide between the two for your own business. Both suites offer business email solutions as well as a collaboration apps and tools. We’re here to help you choose the best one for your needs.

G Suite vs.Office 365: Business Email Solutions Compared

Both G Suite for Business and Office 365 let you create professional email accounts using your own domain name. In other words, instead of having an email address “@gmail.com” or “@outlook.com”, you get an email address that is “@yourbusinessname.com”.

In G Suite, Gmail for Business lets you use an existing domain name to create an email account, or register a new one to use. Each user can have up to 30 different email aliases. Using Gmail for Business is exactly like using a free Gmail account, with the same UI and functionality. 

Office 365 also lets you create your business email account, and gives each user up to 400 different email aliases. The browser-based and mobile Outlook apps are not as user-friendly as Gmail, but there is also a desktop version which is something that G Suite doesn’t offer.

G Suite vs. Office 365: Which Has Better Collaboration Apps?

G Suite and Office 365 both have browser-based and mobile apps for creating and collaborating on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations. Office 365 has desktop apps as well.

With G Suite, you get access to all of the Google Apps including Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Calendar, Chat, Meet, Hangouts, and Contacts. In Office 365 you get access the Microsoft Office apps including OneDrive, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. A big difference here is that Office 365 doesn’t have a proprietary meeting app, like Google Meet, so users have to meet via Skype.

On paper, it might look like G Suite and Office 365 are pretty similar in terms of their collaboration apps. However, when it comes to ease of collaboration, G Suite is the clear winner. This is because G Suite’s apps are 100% cloud-based, and their focus since the beginning has been on making sharing and communication between team members and external collaborators extremely easy and fast.

The Office 365 apps also allow users to collaborate on documents and everything else, but their main weakness is that collaboration isn’t as natural and easy. This is because the browser-based apps are basically just copies of the desktop apps, but they end up being clunkier and less intuitive versions that aren’t as user friendly. So, although Office 365 does allow for collaboration, it is not as easy and intuitive at the G Suite apps are, and you may find yourself using the desktop apps more than the browser-based ones. It is more suited to users who need the advanced features of the desktop versions of Excel and Word.

Which Solution is Best for Your Startup?

There are other ways that we could compare G Suite with Office 365, but for us the clear winner for small businesses and startups is G Suite. Google has been dedicated to making communicating, sharing, and collaborating easy since day one, and it has clearly succeeded in doing this. Office 365, quite frankly, just feels like it’s playing catch up with G Suite.

When you want to create professional email accounts, both solutions will work. However, when it comes to collaboration, G Suite is much more intuitive. It also has many more integrations with other collaboration platforms and project management tools than Office 365 does. For teams that rely on easy communication, sharing, and collaboration (especially remote teams), G Suite is the best solution. Since both platforms have a starting price of less than $10 a month, we think G Suite gives you the most for your money.

5 Reasons Why G Suite is Better Than Office 365

• More intuitive and user-friendly
• 100% cloud-based apps
• Better collaboration apps
• Focused on easy sharing and communication
• More integrations with other tools