We primarily have it for our customers. We primarily use the solution with mobile access, and it's just for having the ability to send and receive emails. It also works with calendars and contacts.
Good documentation, excellent support, and an easy initial setup
Pros and Cons
- "The solution generally works well. We can send and receive emails just fine."
- "The pricing could be a bit lower."
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
The solution generally works well. We can send and receive emails just fine.
It is useful and easy to use.
The initial setup is straightforward.
It's scalable.
The solution is stable.
Technical support is great.
The solution offers great documentation.
What needs improvement?
We'd like to have the ability to recall emails.
I've just used it for six months and am still working to understand the general landscape.
The pricing could be a bit lower.
Certain items have been removed from Mircosoft Booking. They should re-add the capabilities it had before.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for six months at this point. It's been less than a year.
Buyer's Guide
Microsoft Exchange Online
January 2025
Learn what your peers think about Microsoft Exchange Online. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.
832,138 professionals have used our research since 2012.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability of this solution is pretty good. We do find, however, that Microsoft Teams is unstable. Exchange, so far, has been great.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
This solution is definitely scalable. We haven't had any issues at all. I love that I can start with what I actually need and scale up or down as needed from there.
Right now, we have about 50 people on the solution.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support is great. We're happy with its capabilities. There is also useful documentation that can help users understand the solution.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We are not using any other solutions.
How was the initial setup?
The setup is pretty straightforward. It's not overly complex. It just took about an hour to set up everything. We simply had to go through some documentation. After we did that, it was very easy.
We have two administrators that can handle the management. They are global Microsoft admins. We also have an Exchange admin specifically.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing is fine. I've had similar conversations with my customers, and we've found the cost is fair. However, if it could be lower, that would be a plus.
The cost is around $12 to $16 per user.
What other advice do I have?
I'm an end user. We also currently support Microsoft products.
Everything is available in the documentation, and there is great support. It's worth the price, and other users would enjoy having it.
I'd rate the solution nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Symantec Engineer at Plasmate
User-friendly platform with efficient security features
Pros and Cons
- "The platform's security and compliance features are good."
- "Improving the methods for inputting email signatures could be beneficial for the product."
What is our primary use case?
The primary use cases for the email platform in my work are managing emails, scheduling, and collaborating on team documents.
What is most valuable?
The product's most valuable features are email scheduling and the ability to retract emails if needed.
What needs improvement?
Improving the methods for inputting email signatures could be beneficial for the product.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Exchange Online for approximately three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The platform is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The platform is scalable.
What about the implementation team?
Our IT team handled the setup process.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The costs of this platform vary based on subscriptions, but it is generally reasonable.
What other advice do I have?
The platform's security and compliance features are good, and both the online and on-premises versions are integrated with Office 365 tools. It is user-friendly and integrates well with Microsoft Office tools. Overall, I rate it a nine.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Last updated: Jul 8, 2024
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Microsoft Exchange Online
January 2025
Learn what your peers think about Microsoft Exchange Online. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2025.
832,138 professionals have used our research since 2012.
IT Manager at Cerberus IT Solutions
Quick setup, useful online archiving, and highly scalable
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of Microsoft Exchange Online is if you have people that are geographically distributed from each other is good. For example, if you have people in the United States, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia, having an online solution works best because then you can reach the scale of the data centers that are available by Microsoft. Additionally, if you're only going to have two to three people using the solution the cost is a lot less than having an onsite server and licensing. It is highly beneficial in these areas."
- "The support from the vendor is fine. However, it could be faster, and some of the agents could be more knowledgeable, but it is a large solution, there's a lot of information that the agents have to work with. I can't always expect when I get connected to the first-level agent that they will know absolutely everything. Sometimes there's no replacement for pure experience."
What is our primary use case?
Microsoft Exchange Online is used for emails and it does a fantastic job.
The only reason why you would choose an online solution is the company that you're working at is they do not want to have an onsite server. The companies that want something on-site would choose the on-premise version.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of Microsoft Exchange Online is if you have people that are geographically distributed from each other is good. For example, if you have people in the United States, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia, having an online solution works best because then you can reach the scale of the data centers that are available by Microsoft. Additionally, if you're only going to have two to three people using the solution the cost is a lot less than having an onsite server and licensing. It is highly beneficial in these areas.
The online archiving option works well. If you have a lot of emails and you want to keep them indefinitely, then you can use the online archive. It's available permanently and you can store quite a bit of email inside it.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Microsoft Exchange Online for approximately four and a half years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability of the solution is good. I've only had an issue with it once or twice, but that was due to undersea cable damage.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Microsoft Exchange Online is highly scalable.
We have a lot of users using this solution.
How are customer service and support?
The support from the vendor is fine. However, it could be faster, and some of the agents could be more knowledgeable, but it is a large solution, there's a lot of information that the agents have to work with. I can't always expect when I get connected to the first-level agent that they will know absolutely everything. Sometimes there's no replacement for pure experience.
I rate the support from Microsoft Exchange Online a three out of five.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Neutral
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup of the cloud version is similar to the on-premise version. You can have a straightforward or semi-complex deployment. Cloud deployments do not become as complex as the on-premise version, but they can, depending on how it is used.
The deployment of the solution only takes five minutes. It is very useful when deploying from scratch. As soon as you have the domain up and running it is complete and ready to go.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The license for the solution is cheap, but it could be more affordable in the long term.
What other advice do I have?
We have one level two or level three engineer that does the deployment and maintenance of the solution. The online version does not require a lot of people to run it.
I recommend this solution to others and they will not regret it. They should not use other solutions.
I rate Microsoft Exchange Online a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Project Manager at Dell EMC
Great for collaboration and syncing calendars with good reliability
Pros and Cons
- "The solution has been stable with good performance on offer."
- "The solution could be a bit cheaper."
What is our primary use case?
We use Microsoft Exchange for sending emails and running calendars. With the calendars, we are able to check other people's calendars and be sure of their availability so that they can deploy solutions. That's what we normally use it for.
What is most valuable?
The solution is great for collaboration purposes.
The calendar capabilities are great.
The solution has been stable with good performance on offer.
The product can scale.
What needs improvement?
The solution could be a bit cheaper.
I'd like it to be more voice-activated and to have more AI so that it becomes easier to use. The world is moving toward more AI and machine learning, and likely they will adopt more of it in the future.
For how long have I used the solution?
We just migrated to the solution. We've used it maybe for about a year and a half so far.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is very stable and reliable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I've not had any problem with it personally in terms of scaling. Due to the fact that it's connected, it pulls everything down. I'm able to do whatever is needed of me with it without stress.
Everybody is using it now in the company. If it was not scalable, I don't believe over 100,000 staff members could be using it without issues. It has to be scalable.
If we want to increase usage, we simply purchase more licenses.
How are customer service and support?
I've not had any contact with tech support. It's been very stable for me. There has been no need.
How was the initial setup?
I'm not part of the team that does the installation. That said, I know that Exchange should be good in terms of implementation. In the mailing lists that I used to install, the installation was straightforward. If you get your configurations right, it works. It works well without any trouble. This is Mircosoft. I'm sure it's fine to install.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
You do need to pay a licensing fee in order to access the solution. There are also enterprise agreements where companies would have to agree to a certain level of volume.
It could be less expensive. If it was, more companies would use it.
What other advice do I have?
I'm an end-user.
I would recommend the solution to others and rate it at a ten out of ten. It's in the Cloud; people don't need to have anything on-site or to worry themselves with problems any longer. Microsoft takes care of the back end while companies can focus on their day-to-day work and be more productive.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Principal Cloud Architect at a wholesaler/distributor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Reduces maintenance, has zero downtime and is fairly reliable
Pros and Cons
- "I enjoy not having to maintain the local infrastructure, local servers, local whatever. You use the software and don't have to worry about the details."
- "I don't really like the response time of the web GUI for administration."
What is most valuable?
The experience has been rather good. We've had nothing major happen to us. We've had no major downtimes. We haven't lost mail so far, which is good.
I enjoy not having to maintain the local infrastructure, local servers, local whatever. You use the software and don't have to worry about the details. You're not concerned with administration tasks other than managing users, which, of course, our team does on a daily basis, basically.
The pricing is okay.
The solution is stable.
The product scales well.
The user interface isn't too bad.
What needs improvement?
There were a few short outages where mail delivery was flaky.
I don't really like the response time of the web GUI for administration. All this seems a bit slow and not responsive enough. They should provide a far simpler solution for sending mail from machines as this is not really intuitive.
Due to the restrictions that Azure and Microsoft impose on sending mail, for example, if you have an Azure-deployed server that is sending out mails (for a shop system or something like that) it's not really simple. Also, it is not really scalable to use Office 365 as a relay server.
There's not really a useful backup tool that comes along with Exchange Online. You have lots and lots of storage for each user, yet you have to buy extra backup tools just to back it up with an Exchange on-premise. You could do this just with onboard tools, however, there's no such thing in cloud deployment.
For how long have I used the solution?
We completed the migration from Lotus Notes on-premise to Microsoft Office Online or Exchange Online last year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability has been good. We haven't dealt with bugs or glitches. it's pretty reliable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I expect the product to scale well. That is what we are paying Microsoft quite a bit of money for. They have to address scalability, reliability, and things like that. We have the service-level agreement and it's their business to do it. That's what they get the money for.
We have about 3,500 physical users currently using Exchange. There are 1,500 more that are not interactive (for example, service accounts, group mailboxes, and accounts for machines that send mail and things like that). That makes the total number of users 3,500 persons and about 1,200-1,500 users that are not necessarily people.
How are customer service and support?
I haven't had any direct contact with technical support, however, I have not heard complaints as to their services.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We used to have an on-premise deployment of Lotus Notes, however, we discontinued using this and swapped over to Microsoft Exchange Online with the help of an external consultant as there was a lot of mailbox migration to do. That was a quite lengthy process due to the fact that we had several terabytes of mail storage that had to be migrated.
How was the initial setup?
We had a partner help us migrate everything over.
The deployment times depend on a few factors. From the first start to the last migrated mailbox, for us, the deployment took over half a year. That said, actually, it wasn't that long, as we deployed in several waves taking one user group at a time and migrating them over.
Therefore, the real transfer time was much less than the seven months. In total, if you take the net time, it might have only been one month of actual migration. However, we made a point of migrating only on weekends to keep user satisfaction high and disturbance to daily business low.
What about the implementation team?
We had a partner assist us with the process.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Pricing is good. However, it's also not exactly cheap.
It's my understanding that we have a contract that runs for two or three years with an enterprise agreement backing all this up. We do not buy on a yearly basis. That would be unusual for our company to buy for such short term.
What other advice do I have?
Since the project was finished, I'm no longer in an administrative role with Exchange Online. I have passed it on to other colleagues. The administration part is no longer in my hands, for which I'm quite grateful. I don't have to do the daily tasks anymore. My main job is to be the principal cloud architect for the company. I'm, to a lesser extent, concerned with daily administration tasks.
I'd recommend potential new users just go ahead and do it. It reduces the on-site administration chores by quite a bit. It's reliable enough to be used without second thoughts for business if you can handle the cost that comes with it, as Exchange or the whole Office 365 is not exactly cheap, especially when you count in the cost for security-related services that come with Office 365 if you pay for them.
I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten. It works well, just not perfectly.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
CDO at SGROUP
Convenient, easy to install, and scalable when deployed on the cloud, but has too many products integrated with it that it has now lost focus
Pros and Cons
- "What I like about Microsoft Exchange Online is that it's a very convenient solution because it's part of the Microsoft business suite. This is the first email service I've used that lasted for many years, and I'm still using it because it's very convenient and it's suitable for my needs. Microsoft Exchange Online is the best product in the world for me because I don't remember any other service that's so well-accepted."
- "What I don't like about Microsoft Exchange Online is too much integration because now it has many services connected to it. In the beginning, it was just email, and now it's also Teams and Visio, and many other services which I don't like. Microsoft Exchange Online should focus on one service. The product now lost focus, and this is its area for improvement. I would also like more freedom in choosing to use just one service, for example, just Microsoft Exchange Online, which means I don't need Teams or any other Microsoft product or service there. Right now, all services are either in the Microsoft Office suite, or there are more products or services integrated with Microsoft Exchange Online, and I'd like to just focus on one."
What is our primary use case?
We're using Microsoft Exchange Online for our emails.
What is most valuable?
What I like about Microsoft Exchange Online is that it's a very convenient solution because it's part of the Microsoft business suite. This is the first email service I've used that lasted for many years, and I'm still using it because it's very convenient and it's suitable for my needs.
Microsoft Exchange Online is the best product in the world for me because I don't remember any other service that's so well-accepted.
What needs improvement?
What I don't like about Microsoft Exchange Online is too much integration because now it has many services connected to it. In the beginning, it was just email, and now it's also Teams and Visio, and many other services which I don't like.
Microsoft Exchange Online should focus on one service. The product now lost focus, and this is its area for improvement.
I would also like more freedom in choosing to use just one service, for example, just Microsoft Exchange Online, which means I don't need Teams or any other Microsoft product or service there. Right now, all services are either in the Microsoft Office suite, or there are more products or services integrated with Microsoft Exchange Online, and I'd like to just focus on one.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Microsoft Exchange Online for more than ten years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Microsoft Exchange Online is a stable product, in particular, when it's on the cloud. It's stable when it's dependent on the cloud, but if it's deployed on-premises, Microsoft Exchange Online is not stable.
It's a very old product with the same code, even on Windows. Nothing's changed, and my company is using Windows NT for Microsoft Exchange Online with Unix as the code.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Microsoft Exchange Online is a scalable solution.
How are customer service and support?
We haven't used the technical support for Microsoft Exchange Online.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Microsoft Exchange Online is the first service I've used, and all the new services in the market are a little bit different from this solution. Microsoft is a very old company, and almost all of my colleagues started with Microsoft products, so it's just natural to continue using Microsoft Exchange Online.
How was the initial setup?
Microsoft Exchange Online is easy to install.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
There is a license for Microsoft Exchange Online and I have information on that, but there have been so many changes to the licensing and it's a completely different story nowadays. Microsoft has been pushing users to buy a package of products under one license. Users are becoming more dependent on Microsoft rather than independent, that you can't decide anymore, and from my point of view, that is bad.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
My company evaluated Qualitas, Unix, HP, and IBM.
What other advice do I have?
In my company, Microsoft Exchange Online is deployed both on the cloud and on-premises.
More than two thousand people use Microsoft Exchange Online in my company of four thousand employees.
At the moment, there's no plan of increasing usage of the product because of the current crisis.
In terms of whether I would recommend Microsoft Exchange Online to others, with the integration it has, it depends on the focus of the company. For small markets, Microsoft Exchange Online is "too big" because it has a lot of services and you'll be paying for services provided in the package, with some you don't get to use. For end users, this would be difficult, but for companies, especially bigger ones that would have a choice, Microsoft Exchange Online is a good product. My recommendation would depend on the case because every user is different, for example, the purpose is different, the business is different, etc.
My rating for Microsoft Exchange Online is seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Solution Architect at APIS
An affordable and scalable solution that is easy to set up and configure
Pros and Cons
- "The solution is easy to access, and you can bring your own device to access from anywhere."
- "The solution's performance can be improved when you are trying to access it remotely."
What is our primary use case?
Microsoft Exchange Online is a better solution for scalability purposes. The solution is helpful where you need too much infrastructure on-premises.
What is most valuable?
Microsoft Exchange Online has a really good performance. The solution is easy to access, and you can bring your own device to access from anywhere. You can still have the security controls on top of it.
What needs improvement?
The solution's performance can be improved when you are trying to access it remotely.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Microsoft Exchange Online for ten years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Microsoft Exchange Online is a stable solution.
I rate Microsoft Exchange Online a nine out of ten for stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution’s scalability is good.
How was the initial setup?
The solution’s initial setup is really easy.
What about the implementation team?
We implemented the solution through an in-house team.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Microsoft Exchange Online is an affordable solution.
What other advice do I have?
Two engineers are sufficient to deploy and maintain the solution. Microsoft Exchange Online is a cloud-based solution.
Microsoft Exchange Online is easy to set up and configure. I would definitely recommend the solution to other users.
Overall, I rate Microsoft Exchange Online ten out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Manager, Information Technology at a venture capital & private equity firm with 10,001+ employees
It's easy to deploy and scale, but it can be complex to incorporate different departmental requirements into one platform
Pros and Cons
- "Exchange Online is consistent. It's easy to deploy and scale out to all of our organizations."
- "The efficiency could improved."
What is our primary use case?
We use Microsoft Exchange Onlne for communication, collaboration, and some project management tasks.
What is most valuable?
Exchange Online is consistent. It's easy to deploy and scale out to all of our organizations.
What needs improvement?
The efficiency could improved.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Exchange Online for more than 10 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Exchange Online must be reliable and available for our operations.
How was the initial setup?
It can be complex to incorporate the unique requirements of each division into a single platform to meet all of the requirements. It's not hard to maintain Exchange Online, but you need an expert on your team and some outside help from the vendor.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Microsoft Exchange Online seven out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Microsoft Azure
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Updated: January 2025
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