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Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central vs SAP Business One vs SAP ERP comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the ERP category, the mindshare of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is 6.4%, down from 6.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP Business One is 3.7%, down from 6.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SAP ERP is 20.0%, down from 23.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
ERP
 

Featured Reviews

StefaanVandesompele - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides end-to-end accounting and finance module at reasonable pricing
365 Business Central integrates with Office 365 to streamline the invoice approval process. This allows businesses to manage and approve invoices efficiently within a unified system. Our organization plans to transition to the Dynamics 365 environment, where various functions will be centralized. We will consolidate everything into one system instead of maintaining multiple databases for each country with local data. Dynamics 365 is fully integrated, which should address many of our challenges when we migrate to this new environment. We look forward to seeing how it performs in practice. The project is progressing well overall, though integrating it with other tools and ensuring Dynamics 365 operates smoothly can be challenging. Dynamics 365 is user-friendly and effective. However, a deeper understanding of its technical capabilities and architecture might be necessary to optimize its use fully. The software landscape is evolving, and achieving the best reporting and functionality with just a click can be complex. A clear vision of what you want to achieve with Dynamics 365 is essential. Proper preparation and configuration are crucial to achieving the desired outcomes. This principle applies not only to Dynamics 365 but to all software packages. Understanding the system's flexibility and adaptability based on your specific business needs is key to its successful implementation. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.
Ijlal Naqvi - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to deploy but needs to improve in the area of BI
If I speak about a feature in the tool that helps with financial management, I would say that of all the products I have ever worked on, used, or implemented, the finance part is pretty much the same in all ERPs and bookkeeping software tools. Finance is a regulated thing. It has to generate financial statements related to all the accounts. All financial management systems will look into the ledger, accounts payable, and accounts receivable. Generally the tool has two models. If the tool's in-house model is opted, then just one person is needed to maintain the product as an ERP administrator. If it is through a partner, then we usually have managed services, so you get access to a whole bunch of resources, technical, functional, finance, manufacturing, supply chain, or resources that you can have as part of the managed services contract. My company does not use much of AI with SAP Business One since it is pretty much manual now. It's still pretty much manual for business process enhancements and it still requires more of a consultative approach with more of a human touch. With SAP S4/HANA, there is a process navigator, process data mining tool that does help users since with the use of AI it provides answers to their questions. Recommendations are subjective to the requirements of the users. I would not recommend SAP Business One to a financial services institution or a bank. I would most definitely recommend it to a small family-owned business with about 20,000,000 of revenue, and that too in the area of discrete manufacturing. I rate the tool a seven out of ten.
Srinivasan Kuppuswamy - PeerSpot reviewer
The amazing, robust framework with unlimited scalability earns its #1 status
The solution is not ready for the current e-commerce environment. Its was built for large enterprises who need to predictably optimize their human, material, and financial resources. ERP has evolved and businesses are changing. There are not many large corporations. Most are small enterprises with the capabilities of large enterprises through networking and platform integration. Some companies promote products but get things done with other enterprises as a network. Companies do not want to create new capacity but want to leverage existing capacity with innovative products. They do not want to spend resources on duplicating capacity or facilities. I do not think any ERP product is ready to support this environment so ERPs as a whole might end up being used for back-office functions only. It is not easy to evolve an ERP product because its intent is to integrate functions and processes within an organization. Whereas, in the new business model, processes are not limited to one's own enterprise but cut across different enterprises. There is no enterprise solution as this point in time for the current e-commerce environment so companies must integrate with many solutions.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The initial setup is easy - because it stands on Microsoft offerings, it's simple and intuitive to use."
"I have found the flexibility to be very valuable. It's highly flexible, and at least for us, it has been effective. It is also highly functional."
"Microsoft Dynamics NAV is brilliant and it's a different segment when comparing it with Dynamics AX. Dynamics AX is a larger product with much more features and it's aimed at a different segment of the market."
"One developer is enough to maintain the solution. Microsoft 365 is changing technology. The product is a user-friendly ERP solution."
"Its most valuable feature is the user interface."
"The customer support is good. The first level of support agent in every case was able to solve the problem very quickly."
"The vertical covers all aspects of functionality and integrates easily with the existing Office products."
"We use Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central as CRM."
"Add-ons that can be implemented are most valuable."
"I have been happy with the intern purchases, and finance, such as banking."
"The most valuable features of SAP Business One are that it has plenty of features and an easy general ledger entry. Additionally, we have an internal team that supports the solution and they provide is good. The solution is easy for us to support."
"It is quite simple, and it is suitable for medium and small businesses."
"The most valuable features of the solution are reporting, a dashboard, customized reports, and third-party integration."
"What's most helpful to customers who use SAP Business One is that the solution is fully integrated and easy to use. It's very easy to digest and has many features for small to medium companies."
"The solution is scalable."
"It offers users a rather simple interface."
"It automates transactional processes."
"Continuing to use it enabled continuity of business."
"Overall the solution is very good in the industry."
"SAP is more reliable in terms of data quality than other systems."
"It is a comprehensive and robust solution. It can provide lots of functional features."
"The Material Management and Sales and Distribution modules are great. The Financial Accounting module is also great."
"MDG provides a central location for governance of the creation/updating processes of master data. It allows you to change several fields in the same object. For example, we can change a field on the purchasing view and change another field on an accounting view to the same material at the same time."
"SAP is a very process controlled application. It does not allow users to manage the data. Once the initial process is set, it works smoothly."
 

Cons

"Its task scheduling and manufacturing models need improvement."
"Customer service and support are mixed. Sometimes the support is quick, but other times it is very slow."
"I am hoping there is more integration with other platforms, more features, and customization in the next release."
"The price of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central could be reduced."
"There is room for improvement in terms of compatibility."
"Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central has been buggy in my experience and they should improve in this area. Additionally, there are too many updates. The updates involve a whole bunch of applications as part of the package, such as the Edge browser. The updates are too broad across the whole package of applications."
"I would like to improve the tool’s reporting and coding part."
"The product should improve work optimization."
"They have a web client now. It primarily does sales. They just added purchasing. It'll be far more effective when I have inventory and financials as well into the web client version."
"We would like a mobile version of this for sales exhibits, etc. We would also like more personalization features to personalize it for our organization."
"The analytics data capabilities could improve which will provide businesses with much more insight into how their companies are performing."
"We don't have the functionality of the supply chain and mobile applications."
"The price could improve for SAP Business One."
"There is no dependency, the integration between the other applications."
"SAP Business One would be a great product if more customization is available."
"Our business has grown beyond the capabilities of Business One. We need a bigger ERP solution, and therefore we are moving away."
"I'm only working on the front end with ERP's user interface, which isn't very easy for end-users. It's an old-school interface, so it's often challenging to find what you need."
"The solution is quite expensive. They need to work on the pricing to make it more reasonable."
"It would also help if it were more open, more flexible, with more standard products."
"The product is less intuitive and cumbersome for certain tasks."
"Improvements to the UI. The UI is pretty old, but this will change with the upcoming release of S.4.​"
"It is not easily integrated with outside products."
"The flexibility in using the software could improve. I am from a product background and I've been testing a lot of applications, for example, Informatics. The UI, features, and cloud version could improve."
"The user interface could be improved. For example, sometimes you're missing some data and can't complete a task. There should be some built-in support and suggestions on how to solve your problem. I would also like the interface to be optimized to work better with mobile devices like tablets and smartphones."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Currently, the product offers a starting price of $70 per user per month, which provides access to the complete ERP engine. It is highly reasonable."
"The solution is on the cloud and they provide 50 gigabytes of free space on their Microsoft Drive. The reason for this is that Microsoft is requiring you to upgrade all of your systems to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central in order to effectively use the cloud. This means that if you are currently using a different version of Microsoft for a specific purpose that does not require this solution, it can be frustrating to have to spend money to upgrade to this solution just for the purpose of syncing with the cloud. Additionally, even if you do purchase Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, there can still be issues with syncing between the on-premise and cloud clients. This can be especially frustrating as the cloud storage is not free and can be difficult to access even after purchasing."
"$80-$100 per license, per month."
"The solution's license is costly compared to other CRM tools."
"The price of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is reasonable."
"I have some subscription-based customer and a few customers who have perpetual licenses that hosted the application on the cloud."
"Business Central charges a monthly fee of $70 to $100 per user."
"The price of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is reasonable. We pay monthly for the use of the solution."
"The price is a bit expensive."
"I rate the price of SAP Business One a seven out of ten."
"The licensing cost for SAP Business One is affordable, and I'd rate it as four out of five. The license covers the software, the configuration, and the services, but if you want technical support, you'd need to pay for that separately."
"We recently acquired the license, so we are using the latest version."
"The price of SAP Business One is expensive and there is only a standard license."
"We are on a perpetual license for SAP Business One and the price it should be less expensive when comparing it to other solutions."
"If the client's budget is low, they go for SAP Business One."
"SAP Business One is not cheap."
"SAP is a bit on the costly side, but they also provide support and other things. We are paying for licenses and the use of the cloud."
"The product has high pricing."
"My company makes early payments towards the licensing costs attached to the product. There are no additional costs apart from the charges paid toward the subscription-based license offered by SAP."
"The on-premises licensing model comes with annual maintenance whereas the cloud-based licensing model is a yearly subscription. The tool’s pricing is normal and not expensive."
"It could always be cheaper. They don't have a very easy model of licensing, but large entities would get the upper hand in negotiating the license."
"Some components are available at an additional cost, depending on the type of contract that you have."
"SAP ERP is an expensive tool."
"I rate the product's price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. SAP ERP is a costly tool."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Retailer
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Retailer
7%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft Dynamics NAV?
The platform offers a robust and comprehensive cycle for supply chain and inventory management, with features like mi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Dynamics NAV?
The pricing for Dynamics 365 Business Central is reasonable. The value for money is very high.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Dynamics NAV?
There is a need for improvement in consolidation and multi-country master data management.
Are there any advantages of SAP S4 HANA over SAP Business One (SAP B1) apart from the cost?
SaP Business One is a complete solution for business management. The software applications are broad, ranging from ac...
What do you like most about SAP Business One?
It's user-friendly and comes with comprehensive manuals. So, it is easy to learn to use SAP Business One
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SAP Business One?
The pricing model of SAP Business One is average. It is neither too good nor too bad, and there is room for more flex...
Is Anaplan better than SAP ERP?
There are different aspects of both Anaplan and SAP ERP that I like and dislike. Anaplan improves forecast accuracy a...
What do you like most about SAP ERP?
The solution has made the most significant impact on our human resources function, specifically in HR operations and ...
What needs improvement with SAP ERP?
There is a need for improvement in the business analytics aspect in financial reporting and also in sales and marketi...
 

Also Known As

Dynamics NAV, MS Dynamics NAV
Business One
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Harris Farm Markets, Mister Spex GmbH, Bounce Foods, Eurofin Services SA, Medica Medizintechnik, Associated Gaskets, Onduline, Sitka Surfboard Corporation, World Animal Protection
Ego Pharmaceuticals Pty. Ltd
B&G Manufacturing, Unilever, Life is good Inc., Joy Global Inc., City of Cape Town, Bhopal Municipal, Corporation (BMC), adidas Group, Butcher & Packer Supply Company, Franklin Valve L.P., Evoshield, Prime Meats, a Norsan Group company, EMC Corporation, Varian Medical Systems Inc., FC Bayern Mªnchen AG, AkzoNobel Chemicals B.V., T¾V Rheinland, Pacific Drilling S.A., Fire & Rescue New South Wales, University of Amsterdam, Pa_alon S.A.
Find out what your peers are saying about SAP, Microsoft, Oracle and others in ERP. Updated: April 2025.
849,600 professionals have used our research since 2012.