by Zoho Corporation Pvt. Ltd.Business email and office suites
Zoho Mail on your own domain, free for up to 5 users, with paid mail plans from $1 per user a month and a suite with documents and meetings from $3, billed annually.
Business 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.
Mail Lite gives each user mail and shared calendars on the company domain, up to 30 domains, shared mailboxes, IMAP and SAML single sign-on for $1 a month on annual terms, with mail storage sold in 10 to 200 GB units at $1 a year per 10 GB. Mail Premium ($4) adds retention and eDiscovery; Workplace Standard ($3) adds the Writer, Sheet and Show editors and Zoho Meeting. Zoho states SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 for all its cloud services, and the EU data center is chosen at sign-up.
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 | Zoho Workplace | Microsoft 365 Business | Google Workspace | Proton for Business |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| What you're paying for | 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. | 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. | 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 | 8.5Best | 7.6 | 6.8 | 6.4 |
| Free option | Free plan | 30-day free trial | 14-day free trial | 14-day free trial |
| Card to start | No card needed | Card required | –Not measured | –Not measured |
| Getting access | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve | Self-serve |
| Starter priceCheapest paid plan | $1/user/mo | $5.40/user/mo | $7/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; 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 the organization | Per user per month; storage pooled across Mail and Drive |
| Free option | 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 with Gmail; 14-day trial for up to 10 users, payment method needed | 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) | $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 | $50/mo on Business Starter + 100 GB storage ($7 × 5 + $15), computed | $64.95/mo on Workspace Standard ($12.99 × 5), computed |
| Month-to-month price | 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 | $8.40 per user on Business Starter (Flexible plan; $16.80 / $26.40 for Standard / Plus) | $14.99 per user on Workspace Standard ($7.99 / $24.99 for Essentials / Premium) |
| Storage per user | 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) | 30 GB (Starter), 2 TB (Standard), 5 TB (Plus), pooled across Gmail and Drive | 15 GB (Mail Essentials), 1 TB (Workspace Standard), 3 TB (Premium), pooled |
| Domains, aliases and catch-all | 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 | Up to 600 domains, 30 aliases per user, catch-all on every plan | 3, 15 or 20 domains (extra $1.40/mo on Workspace); 10 or 20 addresses per user; catch-all |
| Office apps | Writer, Sheet and Show in the browser from Workplace Standard | Office for the web and mobile on Basic; desktop apps from Standard | Docs, Sheets and Slides in the browser on every plan; no desktop apps | Proton Docs and Sheets in the browser on every plan |
| Video meetings | Zoho Meeting with cloud recording from Workplace Standard | Teams for 300 with recording in the plans with Teams | Meet for 100 on Starter without recording; recording from Standard | Proton Meet for 100 for 24 hours with local recording on Workspace Standard |
| Retention and eDiscovery | Mail Premium ($4) and Workplace Professional ($6) | Litigation hold and eDiscovery export on Premium ($22); archiving add-on $3 | Vault on Business Plus ($22) | Retention policies on Workspace Premium; no eDiscovery |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | 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 reports and ISO 27001 certificates (Compliance Reports Manager) | SOC 2 Type II (report on request) and ISO 27001 |
| HIPAA BAA | BAA template on request from Zoho legal | Included in the data protection addendum by default | Accepted electronically in the Admin console | Offered to all users, signed on request by email |
| EU data storage | EU data center (Amsterdam, Dublin) chosen by country at sign-up | EU Data Boundary for EU and EFTA sign-ups | Data regions on Business Standard and Plus at no extra cost | Swiss jurisdiction; no region choice stated |
| SAML SSO | Every paid plan | Single sign-on for apps with Entra ID on every plan | Every Business plan | Not supported for Proton Mail yet |
| Mailbox export | 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 | Admin Data Export tool on every edition; Vault exports PST or mbox (Plus) | Per user with the Export Tool (EML and JSON); no admin export of all mailboxes |
| Bottom line | 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, 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, 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: 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; Google Workspace: 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 Zoho Workplace'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 Zoho Workplace's US pricing page and plan comparison, the price data file that page loads, Zoho Mail help articles on subscriptions, storage, limits, shared mailboxes, catch-all, migration, eDiscovery, retention, DLP, SAML, logs, two-factor authentication and export, and Zoho's refund policy, terms, compliance, HIPAA, GDPR and data center pages on Oct 16, 2026; we did not sign up or call an API. The pricing page fills in its prices with a script, so we read the US dollar column of the price file it loads; the page's own structured data shows the same prices, and an Internet Archive copy of the file from Apr 2, 2026 has the same plan prices.
The pages are detailed: plan limits, storage add-on prices per currency, export limits (50 users at a time as ZIP, 10 as PST) and the refund rules (a full refund within 45 days on annual plans) are all published. Mail Lite and Mail Premium are sold yearly only.
A few points need a question to Zoho. The 1 TB WorkDrive add-on is $100 a year on the Workplace pricing page and $29 a month on WorkDrive's own pricing page. The pricing page offers a trial of the highest edition, while the help center describes a trial of Mail Premium or Workplace Professional for up to 30 users. Email logs are kept 90 days on the HIPAA page and 6 months on the limits page, and the FAQ's "no long-term contracts" sits next to yearly-only Mail plans. The help center does not say in words whether a shared mailbox takes a licence; the limits page lists shared mailboxes per organization with their own 40 GB.
5 users on Mail Lite with 45 GB of add-on storage each cost $6.88 a month on annual terms; Workplace Standard, with documents and meetings, costs $15 for five (computed).
vs Microsoft 365 Business: Microsoft 365 Business Basic (no Teams) costs $27 and Google Business Starter with a storage add-on $50 for five.
SAML SSO, up to 30 domains, shared mailboxes, IMAP, a free migration tool and PGP encryption are on Mail Lite, and admins can require two-factor authentication.
Compared: Proton Mail does not support SSO yet; Fastmail offers no SSO and describes no admin-enforced 2FA.
Mail Premium ($4, annual) includes email retention, holds and eDiscovery search and export, S/MIME and 50 GB per user.
Compared: Google puts Vault on Business Plus ($22); Microsoft puts eDiscovery export on Business Premium ($22).
Annual plans can be refunded in full within 45 days, and seats can be removed mid-term for credit as a subscription extension.
Compared: Google reduces licences only at renewal; Microsoft allows it within 7 days of buying or renewing.
Mail Lite and Mail Premium have no monthly price, and moving a monthly Workplace plan down requires switching to yearly billing.
Workaround: Workplace Standard and Professional have month-to-month prices ($4 and $7).
Writer, Sheet, Show and Zoho Meeting are not in Mail Lite or Mail Premium, and Workplace Standard has no retention or eDiscovery.
Workaround: Workplace Professional ($6, annual) has the editors, meetings, retention and eDiscovery together.
Mail Free works in the web and Zoho apps only: IMAP, POP, ActiveSync, forwarding and SAML SSO are paid features, and the free plan is offered in some data centers only.
Cancelling moves the organization to the free plan where that plan is offered; otherwise manual cancellation locks the account at once and blocks mail, and after a non-renewal it locks 15 days after expiry. A retention period after cancelling is not stated.
Workaround: Export with the admin backup tool before cancelling; export files are kept 30 days.
Zoho bills per user, yearly for the Mail plans and yearly or monthly for Workplace. For our scenario, Mail Lite 5 GB plus 45 GB of mail storage add-ons per user (sold in 10, 25, 50, 100 and 200 GB units at $1 a year per 10 GB, so 25 + 10 + 10 GB is $4.50 a year) costs 5 × $1 + 5 × $4.50 ÷ 12 = $6.88 a month on annual terms (computed), before tax; this assumes the add-on can be bought on Mail Lite, as the add-on pages name no plan limit. Mail Premium (50 GB, retention and eDiscovery) is $20 for five, Workplace Standard (30 GB of mail plus a 100 GB team drive, 50 GB each) $15, and Professional $30 (computed). Zia AI is included in paid plans with usage limits that are not stated. The 1 TB WorkDrive add-on has two different prices on Zoho’s pages.
Users can export folders as EML files in ZIP archives, and admins can export every mailbox, 50 users at a time as ZIP or 10 as PST (PST on paid plans); files are kept 30 days. Calendars export as ICS and contacts as CSV or vCard, IMAP and a Mail REST API are on paid plans, and Writer exports DOCX and PDF. Cancelling moves the organization to the free plan where it exists, otherwise it is locked; a later retention period is not stated.
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.
| Limit | As recorded |
|---|---|
| Billing unit | Per user; Mail plans yearly only, Workplace plans yearly or monthly |
| Free option | Mail Free for up to 5 users on one domain; 15-day trial, no card |
| Reference scenario (5 users, annual) | $6.88/mo on Mail Lite 5 GB + 45 GB add-ons ($1 × 5 + $1.88), computed; $15 on Workplace Standard |
| Month-to-month price | None for Mail Lite and Mail Premium; $4 / $7 for Workplace Standard / Professional |
| Storage per user | 5 or 10 GB (Lite), 50 GB (Premium), 30 GB + team drive (Standard), 100 GB + 1 TB team drive (Professional) |
| Domains, aliases and catch-all | Up to 30 domains and 30 addresses per mailbox on paid plans; catch-all |
| Office apps | Writer, Sheet and Show in the browser from Workplace Standard |
| Video meetings | Zoho Meeting with cloud recording from Workplace Standard |
| Retention and eDiscovery | Mail Premium ($4) and Workplace Professional ($6) |
| SOC 2 / ISO 27001 | SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001 for all cloud services (report under online NDA) |
| HIPAA BAA | BAA template on request from Zoho legal |
| EU data storage | EU data center (Amsterdam, Dublin) chosen by country at sign-up |
| SAML SSO | Every paid plan |
| Mailbox export | Users: EML in ZIP; admins: every mailbox as ZIP or PST on paid plans |
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 Zoho Workplace 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 Zoho Workplace yet.
Zoho Workplace lists 6 plans. The cheapest paid plan, Mail Lite 5 GB (billed annually), costs $1/user/mo.
Prices as listed, USD, excluding tax; observed 2026-10-16.
Source: zoho.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.
