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Microsoft Office SharePoint Server vs Office 365 comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 29, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Office SharePoint...
Ranking in Content Collaboration Platforms
4th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
4.3
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Office 365
Ranking in Content Collaboration Platforms
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
152
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Content Collaboration Platforms category, the mindshare of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server is 3.7%, down from 9.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Office 365 is 10.2%, up from 4.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Content Collaboration Platforms Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Office 36510.2%
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server3.7%
Other86.1%
Content Collaboration Platforms
 

Featured Reviews

Daniel Giacomelli - PeerSpot reviewer
Security and Compliance at a outsourcing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Has transformed how I manage documents through metadata and automation while enabling structured collaboration
Microsoft should restore some functionalities from older versions of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2003 and 2010. Specifically, bringing back something similar to SharePoint Designer would be beneficial. SharePoint Designer was both advantageous and challenging - developers found it limiting and preferred Visual Studio, while non-developers struggled to use it effectively. A new tool for configuring webpage design and development for content pages would be valuable. The current system is too basic. While integration of filtered lists and libraries is possible, it requires knowledge of Python or jQuery. A WYSIWYG editor would be preferable to requiring programming knowledge or Visual Studio.
BasilJiji - PeerSpot reviewer
System Engineer at a retailer with 10,001+ employees
Collaboration has transformed how our teams work and Copilot now drives faster daily decisions
The interface for the security and compliance center could be simplified. It changes frequently, which can make it somewhat difficult for admins to stay up-to-date on where specific settings are located. The compliance center modification or improvement of Office 365 needs to be introduced. The rest of the features feel acceptable to me. The reason it is not a ten is because of the complexity of managing the vast array of admin settings, which requires a specialized IT team. Even though it meets industry standards for decent security compliance such as SOC and HIPAA, the complexity of managing the admin settings needs to improve.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Microsoft Office SharePoint Server is a scalable solution because our applications are not staying in one place, year on year we are increasing users, so definitely it can scale with what we need."
"The solution is pretty easy to use for the most part."
"The most valuable aspect of the solution is the fact that it doesn't require coding. You just need to configure it. You don't need to code before getting something running. It makes it very fast."
"The ability to create simple web pages with diagrams and links is valuable, particularly for intranet work and creating wiki pages for a team to show how we do certain things."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the Communication Site."
"The ability to work through a web browser without requiring installation on devices is particularly beneficial."
"What I appreciate most about Microsoft Office SharePoint Server is how it centralizes information and collaboration in one place."
"The level of stability is good."
"The most valuable feature is the integration between net and mobile devices."
"The most valuable feature of Office 365 consists of the features that I prefer about this solution."
"The valuable features I use most are Outlook, Word, print to PDF functionality, and Excel; for our meetings, we use Teams regularly, and it serves as a good platform for our ongoing meetings and project management."
"The cloud service and Skype are the most valuable features."
"The most valuable features of Office 365 for me involve collaboration; my work requires collaboration with multiple people on Excel, PowerPoint, and Word, and we use real-time collaboration as well as asynchronous work, where I can continue from where someone else left off."
"The products are quite simple for the end-users to use, the up-time is very good, the product is practically maintenance-free, and the multi-layer security is excellent from the security standpoint."
"I love all of the applications being interlinked. I do not have to separately work on an independent system when it comes to file storage, email, and other tools."
"With Office 365, I have never encountered issues; my experience is entirely positive."
 

Cons

"The ability to preview files in different formats should be expanded to include formats such as embedded postscript (EPS), AutoCAD, and Adobe Acrobat PDF."
"Microsoft Office SharePoint Server is more accessible for the average user, but it lacks certain features that more advanced users would look for, making it seem unnecessarily complicated to do simple things or things one expects to be simple."
"The user interface needs improvement because there is a lot of stuff in there. I use five to eight navigation buttons. It should be more user-friendly. Frequently used menu items should be arranged in a proper way. That would be helpful."
"Searching information internally in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server could be better because when we get a lot of information, it is difficult to find."
"I would like to see more Agile techniques and seamless integration with other applications."
"Technical support could be improved. They are not fast enough, especially when we'll go deeper in the product itself. More complex issues make it very tough to find someone that can help you."
"Making it more intuitive could help teams adopt it faster and use it more effectively by being more user-friendly."
"Probably because I may not have extensively used the advanced search, the search option can sometimes get a little difficult to find out what exactly you're looking for."
"It needs improvements around its compatibility with non-Microsoft products."
"Integration between Outlook calendar and Google Calendar would be a good improvement since many of our team use Android phones and personal Gmail accounts as their main calendar application."
"Office 365 could allow for smoother collaboration with other companies, which is the main reason we use it. The B2B connection is something we need, like global adverse lists between two tenants or multiple users. That's what we're missing at the moment."
"Sometimes the synchronization between the desktop and online is a little bit slow."
"Their support is so terrible and unusable except during dire emergencies."
"There are several additional features we would like to see, such as advanced features of SAN protection in Office 365. The main thing is the SAN protection; we would like to see a lot of advanced features added because we had a lot of spam attacks."
"Constantly evolving with new features, which can be challenging for users."
"Security is still complex, but the admin console improving."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"One of the reasons why we don't recommend the cloud version of SharePoint is the cost. With the on premise version, you pay for the license once. For the cloud version, there is a recurring fee. It is very expensive. They expect everyone to pay $20 or $30 per user per month."
"Pricing plans may be flexible depending on volume usage and your corporate relationship with Microsoft."
"It can be expensive for on-premises deployments, especially when you have to support SQL Server as your backend database. That's where the cost comes into play. SQL Server has its own licensing, which Microsoft keeps on changing. Therefore, it can become costly. In the earlier versions of SharePoint, version 2007 or 2010, they had an express version where the SQL Server licensing was free. It wasn't like a full-blown SharePoint. It was only a slimmed-down version. It used to be whatever your hardware costs. You would install the free software and work with it, but you were very limited in what you could do in SharePoint. If you wanted the SharePoint Enterprise Server with all the bells and whistles, then you had to pay more to get the SQL Server license based on the number of users or servers. The subscription model is different for cloud deployments. Licensing is per user and per month. The cost also depends on the storage required. If you have a lot of sites or documents, then you need to expand it based on your needs."
"There are some aggressive discounts offered by Microsoft for organizations that are not for profit, which we are, and it makes it quite attractive to consider."
"I think that we pay $9.99 USD per user, monthly."
"The pricing is high and has actually caused us to limit the number of licenses we purchase due to budgeting."
"I would rate the solution 3 out of 5 for the price. I think Microsoft presents a good solution concerning the price."
"For the moment, we are paying on a monthly basis because we are still adapting the support and how we want to proceed. I think we will move to paying for the annual license."
"The pricing is not really high, but one can get the software with the license key for free."
"Licensing, billing, and accounting are available from the management interface."
"Good reporting and good value subscriptions for international calls."
"We have a license to use this solution. We have an E3 license which covers many different solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Marketing Services Firm
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise17
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business62
Midsize Enterprise29
Large Enterprise70
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server?
I am not aware of the pricing, so I cannot say if the solution is expensive or quite affordable.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server?
My expectation when I start using a Microsoft product is that it would be easy to incorporate diagrams and such from other Microsoft Office products. Incorporating a diagram I've embedded in a slid...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server?
I produce content about the work I'm doing inside the company, making information about IT architecture, work processes within IT architecture, and security reviews of applications or infrastructur...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Office 365?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Office 365 is that it is moderate.
What needs improvement with Office 365?
Office 365 can be improved by increasing support, which currently is not efficient and takes a lot of time to resolve issues. It has been observed that support personnel often lack hands-on experie...
What is your primary use case for Office 365?
Email and collaboration are the main use cases for Office 365 at Omagi Media Labs. It is used for internal and external communication in daily work. Groups and Teams groups are created and used in ...
 

Also Known As

Office SharePoint Server, MS Office SharePoint Server
Microsoft Office 365, Office 365 Enterprise, Office 365 Enterprise E1, Office 365 Enterprise E3, Office 365 Enterprise E5, Office 365 ProPlus, Office 365 Business, Office 365 Business Essentials, Office 365 Business Premium, Office 365 F1
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Del Monte Foods, Unicredit Leasing, Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, Nokia Czech Republic, Perkins Eastman, JLL, ICA, óxito Software, Dorset Software, PKP Cargo, Arcapita Bank B.S.C., AVE CZ, Chesapeake Energy
Me & the Bees Lemonade
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Office SharePoint Server vs. Office 365 and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,515 professionals have used our research since 2012.