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jhollington · 24 Feb 2017, 10:03 AM

If you're looking to use Outlook, then O365 is pretty much the winner hands-down. O365 is basically like hosting your own Microsoft Exchange server, so it provides almost all of the flexibility that would offer and completely tight integration with Outlook on Windows, Mac, and iOS for not only e-mail, but calendars and contacts.

On the iOS side, you also get the advantage of absolutely native Exchange ActiveSync support if you're using the built-in Mail, Calendar, and Contacts apps (rather than Outlook). This is not something that G Suite really provides to the same degree.... I think they still have "Google Sync" but it's a bit odder by comparison because you're basically trying to map Gmail's way of doing things (archive vs delete, labels vs folders) into a system that wasn't fully designed for it.

It's also worth keeping in mind that G Suite doesn't really do "tasks" that well compared to O365.

Ultimately, I think from a UI point of view, G Suite wins out if you want to work entirely within web interfaces, while O365 is a better choice if you prefer to use native clients.

G Suite of course gives you a few other things that go a bit beyond what O365 offers — your "Google Account" with G Suite will be used for all other things Google from Photos to Search to YouTube.... Google does a better job of trying to be "everything" that you'd ever need online, while O365 focuses on the core communications aspects.

I'm primarily a Mac/iOS users, and Apple Mail is my client of choice on both platforms. I've been a G Suite user for years, but no longer use it for email — basically, I'm paying to keep my Google Account alive, and I do use Google Drive as a secondary backup storage service, having moved primarily over to iCloud as of macOS Sierra. My e-mail is hosted on FastMail (using my own domain name), while I use iCloud for calendars, contacts, and tasks (reminders). I've been back and forth with Gmail over the years, but I only ever used it in the web interface — it was my desire to use Apple Mail that drew me away from Gmail to other services, ranging from running my own server to finally settling back down on FastMail (once they added native iOS push support).

In the midst of all of that, I also considered O365 — I've done a lot of work with Exchange servers over the last decade or so, and have been an Exchange/Outlook/Entourage (the old Mac client) user at various points in my life, but while I do subscribe to O365 for the Office suite of apps, I just didn't see the need for a full Exchange experience as an individual Mac/iOS user.

24 Feb 2017, 10:03 AM	#3
jhollington Essential Contributor Join Date: Apr 2008 Posts: 371	If you're looking to use Outlook, then O365 is pretty much the winner hands-down. O365 is basically like hosting your own Microsoft Exchange server, so it provides almost all of the flexibility that would offer and completely tight integration with Outlook on Windows, Mac, and iOS for not only e-mail, but calendars and contacts. On the iOS side, you also get the advantage of absolutely native Exchange ActiveSync support if you're using the built-in Mail, Calendar, and Contacts apps (rather than Outlook). This is not something that G Suite really provides to the same degree.... I think they still have "Google Sync" but it's a bit odder by comparison because you're basically trying to map Gmail's way of doing things (archive vs delete, labels vs folders) into a system that wasn't fully designed for it. It's also worth keeping in mind that G Suite doesn't really do "tasks" that well compared to O365. Ultimately, I think from a UI point of view, G Suite wins out if you want to work entirely within web interfaces, while O365 is a better choice if you prefer to use native clients. G Suite of course gives you a few other things that go a bit beyond what O365 offers — your "Google Account" with G Suite will be used for all other things Google from Photos to Search to YouTube.... Google does a better job of trying to be "everything" that you'd ever need online, while O365 focuses on the core communications aspects. I'm primarily a Mac/iOS users, and Apple Mail is my client of choice on both platforms. I've been a G Suite user for years, but no longer use it for email — basically, I'm paying to keep my Google Account alive, and I do use Google Drive as a secondary backup storage service, having moved primarily over to iCloud as of macOS Sierra. My e-mail is hosted on FastMail (using my own domain name), while I use iCloud for calendars, contacts, and tasks (reminders). I've been back and forth with Gmail over the years, but I only ever used it in the web interface — it was my desire to use Apple Mail that drew me away from Gmail to other services, ranging from running my own server to finally settling back down on FastMail (once they added native iOS push support). In the midst of all of that, I also considered O365 — I've done a lot of work with Exchange servers over the last decade or so, and have been an Exchange/Outlook/Entourage (the old Mac client) user at various points in my life, but while I do subscribe to O365 for the Office suite of apps, I just didn't see the need for a full Exchange experience as an individual Mac/iOS user.