There is no dispute that Microsoft 365 (formerly known as Office 365) is considered the best suite of business applications, however, many still have uncertainty regarding the different types of licenses available and which would be best suited for them. meet the specific needs of your business.
Understanding the different license types offered by Microsoft 365 is important not only to save financial resources, but also to ensure maximum employee productivity. Considering this importance, in this article, we have created a comprehensive guide to present all available options and guide you on how to select the one that best aligns with your company's reality.
What is Microsoft 365?
The suite that previously went by the name Office 365 is now known as Microsoft 365, and the transition has brought with it considerable expansion beyond the traditional Office family applications.
Microsoft 365 represents a comprehensive collection of applications and services provided by Microsoft to facilitate both business and personal activities. This feature set is delivered through a subscription-based approach, which involves regular payments to ensure continued access to services. This modality offers advantages such as automatic updates, cloud storage and the flexibility of use on different devices, providing an integrated and constantly updated experience for users.
If you want to better understand how Microsoft 365 can optimize your activities and how to select the option that best suits your needs, I invite you to continue reading to explore all the details of this robust Microsoft suite.
Services available in Microsoft 365
Microsoft 365 offers a variety of services and applications designed to improve productivity and collaboration. Follow the main services available below:
- Microsoft 365 apps: essential for productivity in the office environment, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, among others.
- Exchange: Comprehensive email service that offers inbox, calendar, address book, tasks, and security features.
- teams: collaboration platform that encompasses instant messaging, online meetings and file sharing.
- OneDrive: cloud storage that allows access, sharing and synchronization of files through the browser and on different devices.
- SharePoint: facilitates the construction of intranets, content search and data analysis.
- Yammer: the corporate social network, ideal for internal communication and inbox relief.
- Stream: equivalent to an internal YouTube, provides high-performance video streaming and mobile access.
- planner: modern task management tool.
- Delve: Powered by Artificial Intelligence, it makes it easy to search files and people efficiently.
- Groups: collaboration space integrating Exchange, SharePoint, Skype and Planner, where teams can centralize conversations, files, notes, calendars and tasks.
Microsoft 365 License Types
Choosing the right license in Microsoft 365 is crucial to optimizing resources and ensuring your organization has access to the tools it needs to operate efficiently. In this context, it is essential to understand the options available, each tailored to different requirements and priorities. Let's explore some of the main license types offered by Microsoft 365 in more detail.
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Office 365 Business Essentials:
The most fundamental option, Office 365 Business Essentials is ideal for those who don't rely extensively on desktop apps. This plan offers essential features for collaboration and productivity, focusing on essential online services.
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Office 365 Business:
Recommended for organizations that exclusively require traditional Office suite applications, Office 365 Business is a solid choice. It's important to note that email hosting is not included in this plan.
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Office 365 ProPlus:
For users who demand advanced features, but do not require a business email, Office 365 ProPlus stands out as an excellent option. This plan gives you access to the most advanced desktop applications.
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Office 365 Enterprise E1:
Representing the most affordable enterprise option, the Enterprise E1 license is characterized by limitations on access to desktop applications, requiring exclusive use of online versions. This plan is an economical choice for those who prioritize online features.
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Office 365 Enterprise E3:
Among the most popular options for digitally-oriented businesses, the Enterprise E3 license includes desktop applications, email, archiving, information protection, and additional storage options. It's a comprehensive choice for organizations seeking advanced functionality.
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Office 365 Enterprise E5:
At the top of the scale, Microsoft 365 E5 combines features from the E1 and E3 plans, offering the highest level of Microsoft services. With this license, you get audio conferencing, phone system, Power BI Pro, Customer Lockbox and Microsoft Cloud App Security, ideal for organizations that demand maximum features and security.
Choosing and Managing Licenses in Microsoft 365
When facing the decision to choose licenses In Microsoft 365, it is imperative to carry out a careful analysis of the organization's specific needs in relation to the features offered by each plan. Initially, it is essential to evaluate each user's usage profile, taking into account factors such as dependence on desktop applications, the need for corporate emails, security requirements and preferences for online collaboration. This in-depth understanding of operational demands will allow for accurate selection, avoiding unnecessary expenses and ensuring that each user has access to the essential tools for their responsibilities.
After choosing the licenses, the efficient management becomes vital to optimize resources and ensure compliance. Administrative tools built into Microsoft 365 make it easy to centrally assign and monitor licenses. This central management capability provides flexibility to adjust licenses as the organization's needs change, ensuring effective allocation and avoiding waste.
It is important to highlight the need for a periodic review of licenses. The evolution of operations and the growth of the organization may result in new demands, requiring adjustments to the assigned licenses. This continuous practice of review and adaptation is critical to ensuring that the company continues to take full advantage of the capabilities offered by the Microsoft 365 suite, dynamically aligning with constantly evolving goals and requirements.
As part of a project for one of our clients, we highlighted the approach adopted by the team in managing and assigning licenses. The customer previously managed its licenses through Excel spreadsheets, resulting in outdated data and a lack of comprehensive control over the process. Faced with this challenge, the 4Matt team established a strategic collaboration with the client, aiming to develop an innovative solution: an M365 License Management Dashboard. For a more detailed understanding of this case and the results obtained, we invite you to click below and explore more information.
Conclusion
Previously, we provided a concise summary of the options available when purchasing Microsoft 365. Generally speaking, as plans become more expensive, they offer a wider range of options for collaboration, data analysis, and security. However, we understand that it can be challenging to determine precisely what you need and ensure efficient tracking of your licenses.
Rest assured, our team of experts is here to guide you in choosing the right plan. Furthermore, we can support you in implementing these services and train your team to get the best out of them. Contact us, and together, we will find the perfect plan to meet your company's specific needs!
Historic
Microsoft first announced Office 365 in October 2010, starting with a private beta with multiple organizations, leading to a public beta in April 2011, and reaching general availability on June 28, 2011, with a targeted launch. originally for corporate users. Facing increasing competition from Google's similar service Google Workspace, Microsoft designed the Office 365 platform to “bring together” its existing online services (such as the Business Productivity Online Suite) into “one always-updated cloud service” by incorporating Exchange Server (for email), SharePoint (for internal social networking, collaboration, and a public website), and Lync (for communication, VoIP, and conferencing). The plans were initially launched for small businesses and enterprises; the small business plan offered Exchange email, SharePoint Online, Lync Online, web hosting via SharePoint and the Web App with the enterprise plan also adding per-user licenses for Office 2010 Professional Plus software and 24-hour phone support, 7 days a week. After the official launch of the service, Business Productivity Online Suite customers had 12 months to migrate from BPOS to the Office 365 platform.
With the release of Office 2013, an updated version of the Office 365 platform was released on February 27, 2013, expanding Office 365 to include new plans aimed at different types of businesses, along with new plans aimed at general consumers, including benefits tailored for Microsoft Consumer Services like OneDrive (whose integration with Office was a key feature of the 2013 suite). Server components have been updated to their respective 2013 versions, and Microsoft has expanded the Office 365 service with new plans such as Small Business Premium, Midsize Premium and Pro Plus. A new Office 365 Home Premium plan aimed at home users offers access to the Office 2013 suite for up to five computers, along with expanded OneDrive storage and 60 minutes of monthly Skype calls. The plan is aimed at ordinary consumers, especially those who want to install Office on multiple computers. A university plan was introduced, aimed at higher education students. With these new offerings, Microsoft has begun offering prepaid Office 365 subscriptions in retail stores alongside regular and perpetual editions of Office 2013 (which are only licensed for use on one computer and do not receive feature updates ).
On March 19, 2013, Microsoft detailed its plans to provide integration with the enterprise social networking platform Yammer (which it had acquired in 2012) for Office 365, such as the ability to use single sign-on between the two services, shared feeds and document aggregation and the ability to fully replace SharePoint's news feed and social functionality with Yammer. The ability to provide a link to a Yammer network from an Office 365 portal was introduced in June 2013, with heavier integration (such as a Yammer app for SharePoint and single sign-on) to be introduced in July 2013.
On July 8, 2013, Microsoft released Power BI, a set of self-service business intelligence and data mining tools for Office 365, to be released later in the year. Power BI is primarily built into Excel, allowing users to use the Power Query tool to create spreadsheets and charts using public and private data, and also perform geovisualization with Bing Maps data using the Power Map tool (previously available as a plug-in beta known as GeoFlow). Users will also be able to access and publish reports and perform natural language queries on the data. As a limited-time offer for certain markets (but primarily excluding the US), Microsoft has also offered a free one-year Xbox Live Gold subscription with any purchase of an Office 365 Home Premium or University subscription, until September 28, 2013.
Starting April 15, 2014, Microsoft renamed the “Home Premium” plan to “Home” and added a new “Personal” plan for single users.
In June 2014, the amount of OneDrive storage offered to Office 365 subscribers was increased from 20 GB to 1 terabyte. On October 27, 2014, Microsoft announced “unlimited” OneDrive storage for Office 365 subscribers. However, due to abuse and a general reduction in storage options implemented by Microsoft, the 1TB limit was reinstated in November 2014. 2015.
In June 2016, Microsoft made Planner available for general release. It is considered a competitor to Trello and other agile team collaboration services.
In April 2017, Microsoft announced that with the end of mainstream support for Office 2016 on October 13, 2020, access to OneDrive for Business and Office 365-hosted servers for Skype for Business will become unavailable to those who do not use Office 365 ProPlus or Office Perpetual in conventional support. In July 2019, Microsoft announced that the Skype for Business Online hosted service would be discontinued on July 31, 2021, with users being redirected to the Microsoft Teams collaboration platform as its replacement. As of September 2019, Skype for Business Online is no longer offered to new subscribers
In October 2017, the existing Outlook.com Premium service was discontinued and integrated exclusively into Office 365, with all personal and family subscribers subsequently being upgraded to 50 GB of storage.