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This question comes up in almost every first call. The answer that surprises people: both are good enough. We have not seen a company fail because it picked the wrong office suite, and we have deployed both.
So the choice is rarely about feature lists. It is about how your people already work, what they depend on today and what a switch would cost.
The short answer
- Choose Google Workspace if your team lives in the browser, collaborates in real time on shared documents, uses Android or Chromebooks, and your accounting does not depend on old Excel files full of macros.
- Choose Microsoft 365 if you already run a Windows domain with Active Directory or Entra ID, heavy Excel models, industry software that integrates with Outlook, or clients who demand a specific compliance stack.
Where the difference is real
Live co-editing
Google Docs and Sheets were built for simultaneous editing from day one. Microsoft has caught up, but the web versions remain simplified next to desktop Office, and co-editing works best when everyone stays in the browser. In our experience, teams that co-write proposals and reports tend to settle on Google faster.
Excel
For advanced spreadsheet work, Microsoft is ahead. If you have complex financial models, Power Query or VBA macros, do not try to migrate them: Google Sheets does not run VBA, and a rewrite in Apps Script is a project in itself. Keeping a few Microsoft licences for the finance team is a practical choice, not a failure of the migration.
Email and spam
Gmail’s spam filtering is one of the most common reasons companies tell us they want to switch, and in the mailboxes we manage it is consistently strong. The flip side: long-time Outlook users often dislike the Gmail web interface, and that is a real cost, not an imagined one. Outlook can be connected to Gmail as a client, but you lose part of the point of the switch.
A small decision table
| Check this | Points to Google Workspace | Points to Microsoft 365 |
|---|---|---|
| Daily workload | Browser, mobile, shared documents, video calls | Desktop Office, Excel models, Access or Power BI |
| File compatibility | Most files are simple documents and PDFs | Macros, complex formatting, industry templates |
| Identity and devices | No Windows domain, or willing to use Google as identity provider | Active Directory or Entra ID already in place, Intune, Windows-only fleet |
| Management requirements | Central Admin console is enough for your compliance needs | Clients or auditors demand a specific Microsoft compliance stack |
| Total cost | Little legacy to migrate, short training | Sunk cost in Microsoft tooling, expensive retraining |
Price, where the numbers mislead
For comparable business tiers, licence prices are close enough that they rarely decide the question on their own. What you actually pay depends on the plan, the number of users, annual or flexible commitment, and what is bundled (storage, meeting features, security tools). The real costs sit elsewhere: one-off migration work, training and the slower first weeks, and storage limits if you carry a large archive. Current list prices for Google Workspace are on our licensing and pricing page.
When you do need a pilot
Most companies under 50 people can decide from the table above. Run a short pilot with one team if any of these apply: line-of-business software that integrates with Outlook or SharePoint, spreadsheets with macros that nobody fully understands any more, a regulated industry with a documented compliance requirement, or a mixed device fleet you have never centrally managed.
The honest warning
A deliberate hybrid and an accidental one are different things. Keeping Microsoft licences for a finance team while everyone signs in with one identity, mail lives in one system and documents have one home: that is a plan, and it works. The worst setup is the accidental version: half the team on Outlook, half on Gmail, files in two places, two licences per person and nobody sure which copy is current. It happens more often than you would think, usually because a migration was started and never finished. If a switch is worth it for you, do it completely, with a migration plan that includes a rollback point: migration without downtime is routine work when it is planned properly.
Deciding between Google Workspace and Microsoft 365, or living with both? We assess what your team actually uses and give you a costed recommendation. Book a free 30-minute audit or call +371 22 30 50 90.
