by Google LLCBusiness email and office suites
Gmail on your own domain with Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets and Meet, from Business Starter at $7 per user a month on annual terms, with storage pooled across the team.
Gmail on your own domain with Docs, Sheets, Drive and Meet in one per-user plan, with SSO, audit logs and a HIPAA BAA on the entry plan.
Each user gets Gmail on the company domain, shared calendars, Drive, and Docs, Sheets and Slides that several people edit at once in the browser, so a small team does not run a separate office suite or file server. Storage is one pool for the whole organization. Business Starter, at $7 per user a month on annual terms, already includes SAML single sign-on, six months of admin logs, required two-step verification, a whole-organization export tool and a HIPAA BAA accepted in the Admin console.
Against 3 other products we reviewed in Business email and office suites: what you pay for with each, the five access facts, the plan limits we recorded and each review's bottom line. The note under the table says how each one was checked.
| Metric | Google Workspace | Zoho Workplace | Microsoft 365 Business | Proton for Business |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What you're paying for | Easy to adoptGmail on your own domain with Docs, Sheets, Drive and Meet in one per-user plan, with SSO, audit logs and a HIPAA BAA on the entry plan. | Worth the priceBusiness mail on your own domain from $1 per user a month, with SSO, audit logs and an online DPA on every paid plan, and a free plan for 5 users. | Worth the priceA 100 GB Exchange mailbox, 1 TB of OneDrive and Office for the web per user from $5.40 a month, with desktop Office apps one plan up. | Compliance includedEnd-to-end encrypted email and calendar on your own domain, with 1 TB per user, Docs, Sheets and recorded meetings on Workspace Standard. |
| Overall score | 6.8 | 8.5Best | 7.6 | 6.4 |
| Free option | 14-day free trial | Free plan | 30-day free trial | 14-day free trial |
| Card to start | –Not measured | No card needed | Card required | –Not measured |
| Getting access | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve |
| Starter priceCheapest paid plan | $7/user/mo | $1/user/mo | $5.40/user/mo | $6.99/user/mo |
| Pricing model | Per seat | Per seat | Per seat | Per seat |
| Pricing page | Public prices | Public prices | Public prices | Public prices |
| Billing unit | Per user per month; storage pooled across the organization | Per user; Mail plans yearly only, Workplace plans yearly or monthly | Per user per month; up to 300 users across all Business plans | Per user per month; storage pooled across Mail and Drive |
| Free option | No free plan with Gmail; 14-day trial for up to 10 users, payment method needed | Mail Free for up to 5 users on one domain; 15-day trial, no card | No free plan; one-month trial for up to 25 users, credit card required | No free plan on a custom domain; 14-day trial for up to 10 users, payment method needed; 30-day money-back guarantee |
| Reference scenario (5 users, annual) | $50/mo on Business Starter + 100 GB storage ($7 × 5 + $15), computed | $6.88/mo on Mail Lite 5 GB + 45 GB add-ons ($1 × 5 + $1.88), computed; $15 on Workplace Standard | $27/mo on Business Basic (no Teams) ($5.40 × 5), computed; $35 with Teams | $64.95/mo on Workspace Standard ($12.99 × 5), computed |
| Month-to-month price | $8.40 per user on Business Starter (Flexible plan; $16.80 / $26.40 for Standard / Plus) | None for Mail Lite and Mail Premium; $4 / $7 for Workplace Standard / Professional | $6.48 per user on Business Basic (no Teams); $8.40 with Teams | $14.99 per user on Workspace Standard ($7.99 / $24.99 for Essentials / Premium) |
| Storage per user | 30 GB (Starter), 2 TB (Standard), 5 TB (Plus), pooled across Gmail and Drive | 5 or 10 GB (Lite), 50 GB (Premium), 30 GB + team drive (Standard), 100 GB + 1 TB team drive (Professional) | 100 GB mailbox + 50 GB archive and 1 TB of OneDrive (1.5 TB archive on Premium) | 15 GB (Mail Essentials), 1 TB (Workspace Standard), 3 TB (Premium), pooled |
| Domains, aliases and catch-all | Up to 600 domains, 30 aliases per user, catch-all on every plan | Up to 30 domains and 30 addresses per mailbox on paid plans; catch-all | Up to 5,000 domains, 300 to 400 aliases per user; no catch-all stated | 3, 15 or 20 domains (extra $1.40/mo on Workspace); 10 or 20 addresses per user; catch-all |
| Office apps | Docs, Sheets and Slides in the browser on every plan; no desktop apps | Writer, Sheet and Show in the browser from Workplace Standard | Office for the web and mobile on Basic; desktop apps from Standard | Proton Docs and Sheets in the browser on every plan |
| Video meetings | Meet for 100 on Starter without recording; recording from Standard | Zoho Meeting with cloud recording from Workplace Standard | Teams for 300 with recording in the plans with Teams | Proton Meet for 100 for 24 hours with local recording on Workspace Standard |
| Retention and eDiscovery | Vault on Business Plus ($22) | Mail Premium ($4) and Workplace Professional ($6) | Litigation hold and eDiscovery export on Premium ($22); archiving add-on $3 | Retention policies on Workspace Premium; no eDiscovery |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type II reports and ISO 27001 certificates (Compliance Reports Manager) | SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001 for all cloud services (report under online NDA) | Office 365 in SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 scope (Service Trust Portal) | SOC 2 Type II (report on request) and ISO 27001 |
| HIPAA BAA | Accepted electronically in the Admin console | BAA template on request from Zoho legal | Included in the data protection addendum by default | Offered to all users, signed on request by email |
| EU data storage | Data regions on Business Standard and Plus at no extra cost | EU data center (Amsterdam, Dublin) chosen by country at sign-up | EU Data Boundary for EU and EFTA sign-ups | Swiss jurisdiction; no region choice stated |
| SAML SSO | Every Business plan | Every paid plan | Single sign-on for apps with Entra ID on every plan | Not supported for Proton Mail yet |
| Mailbox export | Admin Data Export tool on every edition; Vault exports PST or mbox (Plus) | Users: EML in ZIP; admins: every mailbox as ZIP or PST on paid plans | PST from classic Outlook per user; admin eDiscovery export on Premium | Per user with the Export Tool (EML and JSON); no admin export of all mailboxes |
| Bottom line | From its public pages, Google Workspace is a full collaboration suite with SSO, audit logs, export and a self-serve BAA from Business Starter. Starter storage is small, recording and data regions start on Standard, Vault on Plus, and annual plans cannot be cut mid-term. | From its public pages, Zoho Workplace is the lowest-priced suite here, with SSO, audit logs, shared mailboxes and migration on every paid plan and retention from $4. Mail plans are yearly only, editors and meetings start on Workplace Standard, and a few prices differ between pages. | From its public pages, Microsoft 365 gives a large mailbox and 1 TB of OneDrive per user at a low price, with shared mailboxes, an audit log and a BAA on Business Basic. Retention and eDiscovery sit on Premium or add-ons, and refunds and seat cuts are limited to 7 days. | From its public pages, Proton for Business is the encryption-first option here, with audits, a BAA on request and a 30-day guarantee. The scenario needs Workspace Standard at $64.95 for five, and SSO, admin-wide export and a mail API are not offered. |
Evidence: Google Workspace: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Zoho Workplace: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Microsoft 365 Business: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run; Proton for Business: facts checked 2026-10-16 from its public sign-up and pricing pages, no completed hands-on run. Prices in USD as listed, excluding tax. "–" means not recorded.
Review from public pages
Written from Google Workspace's public pages (pricing, security or privacy, and docs) as read on Oct 16, 2026. We did not sign up, and no hands-on run is published yet.
We read Google Workspace's pricing page, help center articles on the Business editions, payment plans, the trial, storage, add-ons, domains, aliases, sending limits, data regions, the data import and export tools, Vault, 2-Step Verification, cancellation and renewal, the Google Workspace Terms, the Cloud Data Processing Addendum, and Google Cloud's SOC 2 and ISO 27001 pages on Oct 16, 2026; we did not start a trial or call an API for this review. From our location the pricing page shows its South Korea region and introductory offer, so we used the Internet Archive copy of the US page from Oct 15, 2026; list prices are in US dollars in both.
The help center is clear on the main lines: Business Starter, Standard and Plus at $7, $14 and $22 per user a month on an annual plan, and $8.40, $16.80 and $26.40 on the Flexible plan, with storage pooled across Gmail and Drive. The storage add-on is priced on the same pages: 100 GB for $15 a month on any Business edition.
A few points need a check at sign-up. The introductory offer differs by region and by day: the US copy showed 20% to 30% off for 3 months for all users, while its footnote says the offer covers the first 20 users for 12 months. The pricing page says all plans are billed monthly, while the annual plan article says most annual plans are paid upfront. The AI Expanded Access add-on shows its price only after a click, and the full storage allowance is granted after a first $30 payment.
Business Starter ($7, annual) includes Gmail, Calendar, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drive and Meet for 100 participants, with Office file interoperability.
Compared: Fastmail has file storage but no document editors; Proton has Docs and Sheets but no presentations.
SAML sign-in with your identity provider, 6 months of admin and Gmail log events, email log search and required 2-Step Verification are all on Business Starter.
Compared: Proton Mail does not support SSO yet; Fastmail offers no SSO, and its pages describe no way for admins to require 2FA.
The BAA is accepted electronically in the Admin console and covers Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Docs, Meet, Vault and Gemini among other services; no edition limit is stated.
Compared: Zoho and Proton send the BAA on request by email; Fastmail does not offer one.
The data import tool brings mail from IMAP, Exchange Online and Gmail on every Business plan, and the Data Export tool exports the whole organization on every edition.
Compared: Proton has no admin export of all mailboxes; Microsoft 365 puts eDiscovery export on Business Premium.
Meet recording and data regions start on Business Standard ($14), and Vault retention, holds and eDiscovery on Business Plus ($22). Basic email retention rules are listed on every plan.
Workaround: Data regions are included at no extra cost on Standard and Plus.
Starter pools 30 GB per user for Gmail and Drive. A user over their limit is affected in sending and receiving mail; an organization over its pool by 25% or for 14 days cannot add new files.
Workaround: Additional Storage adds 100 GB for $15 a month, 1 TB for $40 or 10 TB for $300 to the pool.
Cancelling an annual plan early charges the rest of the contract with no refund, and licences can be reduced only at renewal.
Workaround: The Flexible plan costs 20% more but can be cancelled at any time without penalty, billed prorated.
The export tool excludes core data once a subscription is cancelled or suspended, and the cancellation article says user data is then deleted and cannot be restored.
Workaround: Run the Data Export tool before cancelling; each export stays available for 60 days.
Google bills per user per month, with storage pooled across the organization. For our scenario, Business Starter gives 5 users a 150 GB pool, so reaching 50 GB per user takes one 100 GB storage add-on: 5 × $7 + $15 = $50 a month on annual terms (computed), before tax. Business Standard, with 2 TB per user, Meet recording and data regions, costs $70 a month for five, and Business Plus, with Vault, $110 (computed). On the Flexible plan the same seats cost 20% more. The introductory discount varies by region and by day and is left out here. AI Expanded Access (Standard and Plus) has no published price, and Vault add-on licences are priced by sales. Business plans stop at 300 users; Enterprise is priced by sales.
A super admin can export the whole organization with the Data Export tool on every edition; exports are deleted 60 days after they start. Calendars export as ICS, contacts as CSV or vCard, Docs as Office files or PDF, and IMAP and the Gmail API are on every plan. The Takeout pages we read do not state the file format for Gmail, and Vault (Business Plus) exports mail as PST or mbox. Once a subscription is cancelled the export tool excludes core data, so export first.
From its public pages, Google Workspace is a full collaboration suite with SSO, audit logs, export and a self-serve BAA from Business Starter. Starter storage is small, recording and data regions start on Standard, Vault on Plus, and annual plans cannot be cut mid-term.
| Limit | As recorded |
|---|---|
| Billing unit | Per user per month; storage pooled across the organization |
| Free option | No free plan with Gmail; 14-day trial for up to 10 users, payment method needed |
| Reference scenario (5 users, annual) | $50/mo on Business Starter + 100 GB storage ($7 × 5 + $15), computed |
| Month-to-month price | $8.40 per user on Business Starter (Flexible plan; $16.80 / $26.40 for Standard / Plus) |
| Storage per user | 30 GB (Starter), 2 TB (Standard), 5 TB (Plus), pooled across Gmail and Drive |
| Domains, aliases and catch-all | Up to 600 domains, 30 aliases per user, catch-all on every plan |
| Office apps | Docs, Sheets and Slides in the browser on every plan; no desktop apps |
| Video meetings | Meet for 100 on Starter without recording; recording from Standard |
| Retention and eDiscovery | Vault on Business Plus ($22) |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type II reports and ISO 27001 certificates (Compliance Reports Manager) |
| HIPAA BAA | Accepted electronically in the Admin console |
| EU data storage | Data regions on Business Standard and Plus at no extra cost |
| SAML SSO | Every Business plan |
| Mailbox export | Admin Data Export tool on every edition; Vault exports PST or mbox (Plus) |
Read from the vendor's public pages on Oct 16, 2026. No hands-on run is published yet. How we check
We have not published a sign-up run for Google Workspace yet. The access facts above were read from its sign-up and pricing pages on Oct 16, 2026.
We have not published API calls for Google Workspace yet.
Google Workspace lists 4 plans. The cheapest paid plan, Business Starter (annual plan), costs $7/user/mo.
Prices as listed, USD, excluding tax; observed 2026-10-16.
Source: workspace.google.com pricing page. Prices change; the observed date above is when our agent read them.
We read the pricing, trust, legal, help center and developer pages of three business email suites on the same day and scored them on the same six indicators. What 5 users with 50 GB each cost, where retention, SSO and export sit, and who should pick which.
