Google Workspace vs Microsoft 365 vs Zoho Workplace: Zoho 8.5, Microsoft 7.6, Google 6.8; 5 users cost $6.88 to $50

On six indicators read from each vendor's public pages, Zoho Workplace scores 8.5 out of 10, Microsoft 365 Business 7.6 and Google Workspace 6.8. For our reference scenario, 5 users on the cheapest plan with email on your own domain, shared calendars and at least 50 GB per user, billed annually, Zoho comes to $6.88 a month, Microsoft to $27 and Google to $50. Zoho stands out for price, a free plan and admin controls on every paid plan; Microsoft for large mailboxes, 1 TB of OneDrive and shared mailboxes on its entry plan; Google for browser collaboration, SSO and a whole-organization export tool from Business Starter.

Zoho is in the Excellent band and the other two in the Good band. The scores measure what the public pages commit to, not how well mail is delivered or how each product feels to use, and we did not sign up for any of them.

At a glance

What the public pages show

Google Workspace sells Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides and Meet per user. Business Starter, Standard and Plus cost $7, $14 and $22 on an annual plan, with 30 GB, 2 TB or 5 TB per user pooled across the organization. SAML SSO, admin logs, required 2-Step Verification and the Data Export tool are on every Business plan; Meet recording and data regions start on Standard, and Vault on Plus.

Microsoft 365 Business sells Exchange Online, OneDrive and Office per user for up to 300 users. Business Basic is $7 with Teams or $5.40 without, on annual terms, with a 100 GB mailbox, a 50 GB archive and 1 TB of OneDrive per user. Standard ($14) adds desktop Office apps; Premium ($22) adds litigation hold, eDiscovery export, Intune and Defender.

Zoho Workplace sells Zoho Mail on its own (Mail Lite from $1, Mail Premium $4, yearly only) or as a suite with WorkDrive, the Writer, Sheet and Show editors and Zoho Meeting (Workplace Standard $3, Professional $6 on annual terms). SAML SSO, shared mailboxes, IMAP and the migration tool are on every paid plan, and Mail Free covers up to 5 users.

Strengths and things to know

Google Workspace. Strengths: a full collaboration suite on the entry plan; SSO, audit logs and required 2FA on every Business plan; a HIPAA BAA accepted in the Admin console; free import and a whole-organization export tool. Things to know: Starter pools only 30 GB per user; recording, data regions and Vault sit on higher plans; annual plans cannot be cut mid-term; the export tool excludes core data after cancelling; and the introductory offer and the AI add-on price are not shown the same way to every visitor.

Microsoft 365 Business. Strengths: a 100 GB mailbox and 1 TB of OneDrive from the cheapest plan; shared mailboxes without a licence; a BAA in the default terms and SOC 2 and ISO 27001 coverage; desktop Office one plan up. Things to know: retention and eDiscovery need Premium or the archiving add-on; no catch-all address is described; refunds and seat cuts are limited to 7 days after buying or renewing; the no-Teams plan has no meetings; and the refund rules and alias limits differ between Microsoft's pages.

Zoho Workplace. Strengths: the lowest prices of the three; SSO, audit logs, shared mailboxes and required 2FA on every paid plan; retention and eDiscovery at $4; a 45-day refund window and seats you can cut mid-term. Things to know: the Mail plans are yearly only; editors, meetings and retention are split across plans; the free plan has no IMAP or sync; a cancelled account moves to the free plan where offered and is otherwise locked; and a few prices and limits differ between Zoho's pages.

Pricing reality

Reference scenario: 5 users on the cheapest plan with email on your own domain, shared calendars and at least 50 GB of storage per user (mail plus files; pooled storage divided by 5), billed annually, at US list prices before tax and before any introductory discount, plus any published storage add-on the plan needs to reach 50 GB.

The plan you need moves the number more than the entry price. For mail plus document editors and recorded meetings, the cheapest options are Zoho Workplace Standard at $15 a month for five, Microsoft 365 Business Basic with Teams at $35 and Google Business Standard at $70 (computed, annual terms). For retention and eDiscovery, Zoho Mail Premium is $20 for five, while Google Business Plus and Microsoft 365 Business Premium are both $110 (computed). Month to month, Google and Microsoft charge 20% more; Zoho's Mail plans have no monthly price.

How we scored them

Every product in this category is scored on the same six indicators, read from the vendor's own pricing, trust, legal, help center and developer pages, with fixed formulas. The overall score is the plain mean. Our methodology page explains how these scores work.

Each product loses points in pricing clarity for prices its pages leave out or statements that disagree between pages; Google also for an AI add-on without a published price, and Zoho for a scenario plan sold yearly only. Zoho's lead comes from its free plan, its price and its exit terms: a 45-day refund window, seats you can cut mid-term and an admin export of every mailbox. Google trails Microsoft mainly on the scenario price, because Business Starter needs a storage add-on to reach 50 GB per user, and on exit terms, where licences are reduced only at renewal and the export tool stops after cancelling.

Also in this category

Proton for Business scores 6.4: end-to-end encrypted mail by default with Docs, Sheets and recorded meetings, $64.95 a month for five on Workspace Standard (computed), but no SSO, no admin export of all mailboxes and no EU region choice. Fastmail for Business scores 5.7: 60 GB per user for $25 a month for five on Standard (computed), open protocols and no lock-in, without office apps, meetings, SSO or a SOC 2 report.

Who should choose which

• Choose Zoho Workplace if you want business mail with SSO, audit logs and shared mailboxes at the lowest price, or free for up to 5 users, and retention from $4. Look elsewhere if you want to pay month to month for a mail-only plan or need desktop office apps.
• Choose Microsoft 365 Business if your team works in Outlook and Office files and wants 100 GB mailboxes, 1 TB of OneDrive and shared mailboxes on the entry plan. Look elsewhere if you need a catch-all address or eDiscovery without Business Premium.
• Choose Google Workspace if your team edits documents together in the browser and you want SSO, audit logs, a self-serve BAA and a whole-organization export from the entry plan. Look elsewhere if you need 50 GB per user on Starter without an add-on or want to cut seats mid-term.

Bottom line

From public pages alone, Zoho Workplace leads at 8.5: the lowest price for our scenario, a free plan and admin controls on every paid plan. Microsoft 365 Business follows at 7.6 with the most storage on its entry plan, and Google Workspace at 6.8 with the broadest collaboration tools on Business Starter. For all three, compare the plan that has the storage, retention, editors and meetings you need, not the entry price.

How we checked

We read the vendors' pricing pages and plan comparisons, trust and compliance pages, legal terms, help center articles and developer docs on Oct 16, 2026. Google's pricing page shows its South Korea region from our location, so we used the Internet Archive copy of the US page from Oct 15, 2026; Zoho's pricing page fills in prices with a script, so we read the US dollar column of the price file it loads. We did not sign up, start a trial or call an API. Facts the pages did not state, such as the price of Google's AI Expanded Access, are left out rather than guessed. Every figure is on the vendors' pages as of that date or, where marked, computed from them.