Microsoft 365 vs Google Workspace: Which is Better for Business?

Choosing between Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace is one of the most important technology decisions any UK business will make. Your productivity suite affects every employee, every day — from email communication and document collaboration to video conferencing and data security. With both platforms evolving rapidly and competing fiercely for market share, making the right choice in 2026 requires a thorough, unbiased comparison.

At Cloudswitched, we’ve migrated hundreds of UK businesses to both platforms. While we generally recommend Microsoft 365 for most organisations, we believe in presenting the full picture so you can make the best decision for your specific needs. This comprehensive guide breaks down every aspect of both platforms — features, pricing, security, collaboration, and more — to help you choose with confidence.

The UK Business Productivity Landscape in 2026

The UK productivity software market has shifted dramatically over the past few years. Remote and hybrid working models, once considered temporary, are now firmly embedded in British business culture. According to the Office for National Statistics, over 40% of UK workers now operate in a hybrid arrangement, making cloud-based productivity tools not just convenient but essential.

Both Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace have responded to this shift with significant platform updates. Microsoft has deepened its integration with Copilot AI across every application, while Google has embedded Gemini AI throughout Workspace. But beyond the headline features, the platforms differ significantly in philosophy, capability, and suitability for different types of organisations.

Pricing Comparison: Microsoft 365 vs Google Workspace

For UK businesses watching their IT budgets, pricing is often the first consideration. Both platforms offer tiered plans, but the value proposition at each tier differs considerably. Let’s break down the current UK pricing structure.

Microsoft 365 Business Plans

Plan	Price (Per User/Month)	Email	Desktop Apps	Storage	Key Features
Business Basic	£4.60	✓	Web & Mobile Only	1 TB OneDrive	Teams, SharePoint, Exchange Online
Business Standard	£9.40	✓	✓ Full Desktop	1 TB OneDrive	All Basic + Desktop Apps, Clipchamp, Loop
Business Premium	£16.60	✓	✓ Full Desktop	1 TB OneDrive	All Standard + Intune, Azure AD P1, Defender
Apps for Business	£8.25	✗	✓ Full Desktop	1 TB OneDrive	Desktop Apps Only, No Email

Google Workspace Plans

Plan	Price (Per User/Month)	Email	Desktop Apps	Storage	Key Features
Business Starter	£5.20	✓	Web & Mobile Only	30 GB per user	Gmail, Meet (100 participants), Chat
Business Standard	£10.40	✓	Web & Mobile Only	2 TB per user	All Starter + Meet recording, AppSheet
Business Plus	£15.60	✓	Web & Mobile Only	5 TB per user	All Standard + Vault, Advanced Endpoint
Enterprise	Custom Pricing	✓	Web & Mobile Only	5 TB+ per user	All Plus + DLP, S/MIME, Custom Search

Pricing Verdict

At the entry level, Microsoft 365 Business Basic (£4.60/user/month) undercuts Google Workspace Business Starter (£5.20/user/month) while offering more storage (1 TB vs 30 GB). At the mid-tier, Microsoft 365 Business Standard (£9.40) includes full desktop Office apps, whereas Google Workspace Business Standard (£10.40) still only provides web-based applications. The value gap becomes even more pronounced when you factor in the desktop application suite that millions of businesses depend on daily.

Feature-by-Feature Comparison

Beyond pricing, the features each platform offers determine how well they’ll serve your organisation. Let’s examine every major category in detail.

Email & Calendar

Email remains the backbone of business communication. Both platforms offer professional email with custom domains, but the experience differs significantly.

Microsoft 365 (Outlook) provides a mature, feature-rich email client available as a desktop application, web app, and mobile app. Outlook’s desktop client is the gold standard in corporate email, offering advanced features like focused inbox, rules, shared mailboxes, distribution groups, and deep calendar integration. Exchange Online provides 50 GB mailboxes on all business plans and supports advanced compliance features like litigation hold and in-place archiving.

Google Workspace (Gmail) offers a clean, intuitive web-based email experience that many users find refreshing. Gmail’s search capabilities are excellent, and its tabbed inbox (Primary, Social, Promotions) helps manage incoming mail. However, Gmail lacks a dedicated desktop application — you’re using a browser tab. Google Calendar is highly capable and many users prefer its clean interface to Outlook’s calendar.

Document Creation & Collaboration

How your team creates, edits, and shares documents is critical to productivity. This is where the two platforms diverge most sharply.

Microsoft 365 includes the industry-standard desktop applications — Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Publisher — alongside their web-based counterparts. Excel remains unmatched for complex spreadsheets, financial modelling, and data analysis. Word provides advanced document formatting, mail merge, and referencing tools that Docs simply cannot replicate. The web versions of these apps have improved dramatically and now support real-time co-authoring, but the desktop applications provide the full power users expect.

Google Workspace offers Docs, Sheets, and Slides — all web-based, all designed from the ground up for collaboration. Real-time co-editing in Google Docs is exceptionally smooth, and the simplicity of sharing a link to collaborate has made Google’s approach beloved by many teams. However, Google Sheets lacks the depth of Excel for advanced use cases, and Google Slides is noticeably less capable than PowerPoint for complex presentations.

Video Conferencing & Communication

Video conferencing has become mission-critical for UK businesses. Both platforms include robust video meeting capabilities, but the ecosystems around them differ.

Microsoft Teams has become the dominant business communication platform in the UK. It combines chat, video meetings, file sharing, and third-party app integrations into a single hub. Teams supports meetings with up to 300 participants on Business plans and 1,000 on Enterprise plans, with features like breakout rooms, live captions, meeting recordings, and background effects. Teams also includes a full telephony solution (Teams Phone) that can replace traditional phone systems.

Google Meet is Google’s video conferencing solution, accessible via browser or mobile app. Meet supports up to 100 participants on Starter plans and 500 on Business Plus. Google Chat provides the instant messaging component. While Meet is clean and reliable, it lacks the depth of Teams — no native telephony solution, fewer meeting features, and a less integrated ecosystem.

Feature	Microsoft Teams	Google Meet & Chat
Max Meeting Participants (Business)	300	100–500 (plan dependent)
Meeting Recording	✓ All Business plans	✓ Standard+ only
Breakout Rooms	✓	✓
Live Captions & Transcription	✓ 30+ languages	✓ Limited languages
Telephony / PSTN Calling	✓ Teams Phone (add-on)	✗ Requires third-party
Persistent Chat Channels	✓ Full channels & threads	✓ Spaces & threads
Desktop Application	✓ Windows, Mac, Linux	✗ Browser-based (PWA available)
Third-Party App Integrations	✓ 1,400+ apps	✓ 5,000+ Marketplace apps
Whiteboarding	✓ Microsoft Whiteboard	✓ Google Jamboard (discontinued) / FigJam
Webinar Capabilities	✓ Teams Webinars (up to 1,000)	Limited (Meet add-ons)

Cloud Storage & File Management

Cloud storage is fundamental to how modern businesses manage their files. The difference between the two platforms is stark at the entry level.

Microsoft 365 provides 1 TB of OneDrive storage per user on every business plan — including the £4.60/month Basic plan. SharePoint Online adds team-level document management with version control, metadata, workflows, and sophisticated permission structures. For businesses managing large volumes of documents, SharePoint’s library structure and search capabilities are invaluable.

Google Workspace offers just 30 GB per user on the Business Starter plan (£5.20/month), which can fill quickly with email attachments and Google Drive files. You need to step up to Business Standard (£10.40) for 2 TB per user. Google Drive’s sharing model is simpler than SharePoint, which some teams prefer, but it lacks the advanced document management features that larger organisations require.

Security & Compliance

For UK businesses subject to GDPR and industry-specific regulations, security and compliance capabilities are non-negotiable. This is an area where Microsoft 365 has a commanding lead.

Microsoft 365 Security

Microsoft has invested billions in security, and it shows across the 365 platform. Even the Business Basic plan includes Exchange Online Protection (EOP) for email security, multi-factor authentication, and basic data loss prevention. Microsoft 365 Business Premium (£16.60/user/month) is where security truly excels, bundling:

• Microsoft Defender for Office 365 — Advanced threat protection against phishing, malware, and zero-day attacks
• Microsoft Intune — Mobile device management and endpoint protection
• Azure Active Directory P1 — Conditional access policies, identity protection
• Azure Information Protection — Document classification and encryption
• Microsoft Purview — Compliance management, data loss prevention, retention policies
• Advanced Audit — Extended audit log retention for compliance investigations

Google Workspace Security

Google Workspace provides solid baseline security with built-in protection against phishing and spam in Gmail, two-step verification, and endpoint management. However, advanced security features are reserved for higher-tier plans:

• Google Vault — Available on Business Plus and above for archiving and eDiscovery
• Advanced Endpoint Management — Business Plus and above
• DLP (Data Loss Prevention) — Enterprise plan only
• S/MIME Encryption — Enterprise plan only
• Security Investigation Tool — Enterprise plan only
• Context-Aware Access — Enterprise plan only

Security Ratings

AI & Productivity Features

2026 marks the year AI became truly embedded in productivity suites. Both Microsoft and Google have made enormous investments in AI-powered features, but the implementations differ significantly.

Microsoft Copilot

Microsoft 365 Copilot is an AI assistant integrated across Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Teams, and more. It can draft documents, summarise email threads, create presentations from prompts, analyse spreadsheet data, and generate meeting summaries. Copilot is available as an add-on at £25/user/month on top of your Microsoft 365 subscription.

Google Gemini

Google has integrated Gemini AI throughout Workspace — in Gmail for email drafting, in Docs for content creation, in Sheets for data analysis, and in Meet for meeting notes. Gemini is included in certain plans and available as the Gemini Business add-on (£16/user/month) or Gemini Enterprise (£25/user/month) for advanced features.

AI Feature	Microsoft Copilot	Google Gemini
Email Drafting & Summarisation	✓ Outlook Copilot	✓ Gmail Gemini
Document Generation	✓ Word Copilot	✓ Docs Gemini
Spreadsheet Analysis	✓ Excel Copilot	✓ Sheets Gemini
Presentation Creation	✓ PowerPoint Copilot	✓ Slides Gemini
Meeting Summaries	✓ Teams Copilot	✓ Meet Gemini
Add-on Price	£25/user/month	£16–£25/user/month
Enterprise Data Grounding	✓ Microsoft Graph	✓ Google Search & Drive

Market Share & Adoption in the UK

Understanding what other UK businesses choose can inform your decision. Microsoft 365 dominates the UK enterprise market, while Google Workspace has found strong adoption among startups, creative agencies, and education.

Integration & Ecosystem

No productivity platform exists in isolation. How well each suite integrates with your existing tools, line-of-business applications, and third-party services matters enormously.

Microsoft 365 Ecosystem

Microsoft’s ecosystem advantage is substantial for most UK businesses. Active Directory integration means Microsoft 365 works seamlessly with on-premises Windows infrastructure — a critical consideration for organisations that haven’t fully migrated to the cloud. The Power Platform (Power BI, Power Automate, Power Apps) provides low-code tools for business intelligence, workflow automation, and custom app development. Integration with Dynamics 365 CRM/ERP, Azure cloud services, and LinkedIn creates a comprehensive business technology stack.

Google Workspace Ecosystem

Google’s ecosystem excels in simplicity and web-native integration. Google Workspace works beautifully with other Google services — Google Ads, Google Analytics, YouTube, and Google Cloud Platform. AppSheet (included in Business Standard+) provides no-code app development capabilities. The Google Workspace Marketplace offers thousands of add-ons, and Google’s APIs are well-documented and developer-friendly.

Integration Area	Microsoft 365	Google Workspace
Active Directory / On-Premises	✓ Native Integration	Via GCDS / Third-Party
Business Intelligence	Power BI	Looker Studio (Basic)
Workflow Automation	Power Automate	AppSheet / Apps Script
CRM / ERP	Dynamics 365	Third-Party Required
Cloud Platform	Azure	Google Cloud Platform
Marketing Tools	LinkedIn, Dynamics Marketing	Google Ads, Analytics, YouTube
Developer APIs	Microsoft Graph API	Google APIs (well-documented)
Third-Party Marketplace	AppSource (1,400+ apps)	Marketplace (5,000+ add-ons)

Administration & Management

How easy each platform is to administer affects your IT team’s workload and your organisation’s agility.

Microsoft 365 Admin Centre is comprehensive but complex. It provides granular control over every aspect of the platform — user management, security policies, compliance settings, device management, and reporting. The trade-off is that it can be overwhelming for small businesses without dedicated IT staff. Multiple admin portals (Exchange Admin, SharePoint Admin, Teams Admin, Security & Compliance Centre) add to the learning curve.

Google Admin Console is notably simpler and more intuitive. User management, security settings, and device management are centralised in a clean interface. For small businesses, Google’s admin experience is less daunting. However, it offers fewer granular controls compared to Microsoft’s admin tools, which can be a limitation for larger organisations with complex requirements.

Migration Considerations

If you’re switching from one platform to the other — or migrating from an on-premises solution — the migration process deserves careful planning. Both platforms offer migration tools, but the complexity varies.

Migrating to Microsoft 365

Microsoft provides several migration pathways depending on your source environment:

• From Google Workspace: Microsoft’s built-in migration tool can transfer email, calendar, and contacts from Gmail. Third-party tools like BitTitan MigrationWiz handle Google Drive to OneDrive/SharePoint migration more effectively.
• From On-Premises Exchange: Hybrid migration with Exchange Online provides a seamless cutover with minimal downtime. Coexistence during migration ensures users can send and receive mail throughout the process.
• From Other Providers: IMAP migration is available for virtually any email provider, and PST import handles Outlook data files.

Migrating to Google Workspace

Google offers its own migration tools:

• From Microsoft 365: Google’s data migration service can transfer email, calendar, and contacts from Exchange Online. However, migrating OneDrive/SharePoint content to Google Drive requires third-party tools and careful planning around file format conversion.
• From On-Premises Exchange: Google’s migration tool supports direct IMAP or Exchange migration, though it’s generally less seamless than Microsoft’s hybrid migration approach.

Migration Complexity Ratings

Who Should Choose Which Platform?

After extensive analysis, here are our recommendations based on business type and priorities.

Choose Microsoft 365 If You...

• Rely on desktop applications like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
• Need advanced email features with Outlook desktop client
• Require comprehensive security and compliance tools
• Have existing Windows/Active Directory infrastructure
• Use or plan to use Microsoft Teams as your communication hub
• Need Power BI, Power Automate, or Power Apps
• Work in a regulated industry (financial services, legal, healthcare)
• Want a telephony solution integrated with your productivity suite
• Have complex spreadsheet needs (financial modelling, macros, VBA)
• Require 1 TB storage per user without paying for premium plans

Choose Google Workspace If You...

• Prioritise simplicity and ease of use above all else
• Are a startup or small creative agency with a web-first culture
• Need seamless real-time collaboration as your primary workflow
• Heavily use Google services (Google Ads, Analytics, YouTube)
• Don’t need desktop Office applications
• Prefer a simpler admin experience with less IT overhead
• Want integrated no-code app development (AppSheet)
• Are an education institution
• Have users who are already highly proficient with Google tools
• Need generous storage at the Business Plus tier (5 TB per user)

Overall Platform Ratings

Based on our comprehensive assessment across all categories, here’s how the two platforms compare overall for UK businesses.

The Cloudswitched Verdict

After years of deploying, managing, and supporting both platforms for UK businesses of every size, Cloudswitched recommends Microsoft 365 for the majority of UK organisations. Here’s why:

Microsoft 365 delivers better value at every price point. For £4.60/user/month, you get 1 TB of storage, Exchange email with a 50 GB mailbox, Teams, and SharePoint — features that would cost £10.40+ on Google Workspace to match in storage alone. When you factor in desktop Office applications at the Standard tier (£9.40), the value proposition becomes overwhelming. No Google Workspace plan at any price includes desktop-class productivity apps.

Security and compliance are not optional. UK businesses face increasing regulatory pressure under GDPR, and many industries have additional compliance requirements. Microsoft 365 Business Premium (£16.60/user/month) provides an enterprise-grade security stack — Defender, Intune, Conditional Access, Purview — that would require Google Workspace Enterprise (custom pricing, typically £20+/user/month) to approximate.

The ecosystem matters. Most UK businesses operate in a Microsoft-centric world. Active Directory, Windows desktops, Office file formats, and Outlook are deeply embedded in British business culture. Microsoft 365 slots into this environment seamlessly, while Google Workspace requires more adaptation.

That said, Google Workspace is genuinely excellent for certain use cases. Startups and small creative agencies that live in the browser, don’t need desktop apps, and prioritise collaboration simplicity can thrive on Google Workspace. Education institutions benefit enormously from Google’s generous education pricing and Chromebook integration. And businesses heavily invested in Google’s advertising and analytics ecosystem find natural synergies with Workspace.

How Cloudswitched Can Help

Whether you’re choosing between Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, migrating from one platform to the other, or optimising your current setup, Cloudswitched is here to help. As a trusted UK IT partner, we provide:

• Free Consultation — We’ll assess your business needs and recommend the right platform and plan
• Seamless Migration — Zero-downtime migration of email, files, calendars, and contacts
• Security Configuration — Proper setup of MFA, conditional access, DLP, and compliance policies
• Ongoing Management — Licence management, user provisioning, and technical support
• User Training — Help your team get the most from their new productivity platform
• Cost Optimisation — Ensure you’re on the right plans and not overspending on unused licences