A plain English guide to the Microsoft 365 business plans: what Basic, Standard and Premium each include, when the extra security in Premium is worth it, and where E3 fits.
Almost every small business we speak to in the North East uses Microsoft 365 in some form. Far fewer are sure they are on the right plan. Some are paying for features they never switched on, while others are running a business on the cheapest licence and missing the security tools that would protect them most. This guide explains the three main Microsoft 365 business plans in plain English, what each one actually includes and how to decide which is right for your team.
We have deliberately left prices out. Microsoft changes its list prices from time to time and prices differ by country and by how you buy, so always check the current figure with Microsoft or your provider before you budget.
Microsoft sells a family of plans called Microsoft 365 for business. The three you will hear about most are Business Basic, Business Standard and Business Premium. Each plan includes everything in the one below it, plus more.
| Feature | Business Basic | Business Standard | Business Premium |
|---|---|---|---|
| Business email with Exchange Online | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook on the web and mobile | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Installed desktop apps for Windows and Mac | No | Yes | Yes |
| Microsoft Intune device management | No | No | Yes |
| Microsoft Defender for Business | No | No | Yes |
| Defender for Office 365 Plan 1 email protection | No | No | Yes |
| Entra ID P1 with conditional access | No | No | Yes |
| Purview information protection and data loss prevention | No | No | Yes |
This summary is based on Microsoft's own service descriptions and product pages. Microsoft adds and moves features between plans over time, so treat it as a guide and check the current details before you buy.
In the UK, Microsoft also sells versions of these plans without Teams, for organisations that use a different meeting and chat tool. If your team lives in Teams, make sure you are buying the version that includes it.
Business Basic is the entry point. Every user gets a business mailbox on your own domain, Teams for chat and meetings, SharePoint and OneDrive for file storage and sharing, and the web and mobile versions of the Office apps. Microsoft lists 1 TB of OneDrive storage per user.
What it does not include is the installed desktop apps. Your team can open and edit documents in a browser or on a phone, and for many people that is enough. It suits staff who mainly work with email and simple documents, frontline workers, or anyone who already has a separate licence for the desktop apps.
The catch is that people who work with large spreadsheets, complex Word templates or add ins for accounts and practice management software usually find the web versions limiting.
Business Standard includes everything in Basic plus the full desktop versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and the other Office apps, which each user can install on several of their own devices. Microsoft also bundles extra apps such as Clipchamp for video editing.
For a typical office based team, Standard is where most businesses start. It gives people the tools they are used to. What it does not give you is much control over the devices those apps run on, or the more advanced identity and security features. You still get the protection that comes with every Microsoft 365 tenant, such as basic spam and malware filtering and the ability to turn on multi factor authentication, but you have fewer tools to enforce good practice.
Business Premium is Business Standard plus a bundle of security and management tools that would otherwise be bought separately. Microsoft describes it as including Defender for Business, Defender for Office 365 Plan 1, Intune Plan 1, Entra ID P1 and Purview information protection. In plain English, that means:
Intune lets you manage company laptops and phones centrally. You can push out settings and software, require encryption and a PIN, keep Windows updated and wipe a lost or stolen device remotely. It also lets you set up a new laptop straight out of the box with Windows Autopilot, which makes onboarding new starters far quicker.
Defender for Business is endpoint detection and response, which watches devices for suspicious behaviour rather than just known viruses, and can isolate a computer if it looks compromised. Our guide to what EDR is explains why that matters.
Entra ID P1 adds conditional access. This lets you set rules such as "only allow sign in from company managed devices", "require multi factor authentication from outside the office" or "block sign ins from countries we do not work in". For many businesses this is the single most valuable part of Premium, because stolen passwords are one of the commonest ways attackers get in.
Defender for Office 365 Plan 1 adds extra checks on links and attachments in email and Teams, which helps against phishing. Purview lets you label sensitive documents and stop certain information, such as bank details, being shared outside the business.
Premium tends to make sense if any of these apply to you:
The tools are only valuable if they are configured. Buying Premium and leaving the defaults in place gives you a licence, not protection.
Microsoft's service description states that the Business plans are designed for organisations with up to 300 users, and that the limit applies across the whole Business family of plans in a tenant. If you have 250 Business Premium users, you can only add 50 more Business licences of any kind.
Organisations above that size move to the Enterprise plans. Microsoft 365 E3 is the usual step up. It includes the Office apps, Intune and Entra ID P1 like Premium, and adds enterprise features such as larger mailboxes and more advanced compliance tools. For most businesses with 5 to 100 staff, E3 is more than is needed, and Business Premium covers the same everyday security ground.
We help businesses in Sunderland and across the North East choose, buy and configure Microsoft 365, from moving email across to switching on conditional access and Intune properly. If you are not sure whether your current licences fit how your team works, our Microsoft 365 service page explains what we do, or you can book a free IT review and we will look at your setup with you.
Business Premium includes everything in Business Standard plus security and management tools: Intune for managing devices, Defender for Business for protecting them, Defender for Office 365 Plan 1 for email, Entra ID P1 for conditional access and Purview information protection.
It includes the web and mobile versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook, but not the installed desktop apps. For the desktop apps you need Business Standard, Business Premium or a separate apps licence.
Yes. Microsoft allows you to combine different plans in a single tenant, so you can give each person the licence that suits their role. The 300 user limit applies across all Business plans combined.
Microsoft designs the Business plans for organisations of up to 300 users across the whole Business family in a tenant. Larger organisations should look at Enterprise plans such as Microsoft 365 E3.
Our guides are written by the team who support businesses across the North East every day. If anything here raises a question about your own setup, ask us.
Book a free, no obligation IT review. We will look at your setup, tell you honestly what needs attention and give you a clear fixed monthly price.
