Google Workspace vs Zimbra Collaboration comparison

Google and Zimbra are both solutions in the Email Applications category. Google is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.1, while Zimbra is ranked #5 with an average rating of 8.0. Google holds a 22.9% mindshare in EA, compared to Zimbra’s 9.0% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Google users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Zimbra users who would recommend it.

Google Workspace

Read 101 Google Workspace reviews

6,268 Views
5,616 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Zimbra Collaboration

Read 29 Zimbra Collaboration reviews

2,972 Views
2,295 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Google Workspace

Zimbra Collaboration

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 5, 2025

Zimbra Collaboration and Google Workspace are business communication and collaboration tools. Google Workspace seems to have the upper hand due to its extensive feature set and seamless integration options.

Features: Zimbra Collaboration includes tools for email, calendar, and task management along with robust integration capabilities. It allows customization and administration with a good web interface and security modules. Google Workspace offers an integrated suite with Gmail, Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Meet, facilitating seamless collaboration and real-time editing. Its vast application suite and third-party integrations provide comprehensive productivity solutions.

Room for Improvement: Zimbra could enhance its user interface and mobile app functionalities. Improvement in anti-spam and antivirus modules would be beneficial. More robust scalability and refinement in admin tools are needed. Google Workspace could focus on improving its cost-effectiveness for small businesses and enhancing offline support. Providing more intuitive initial setup and increasing support for non-Google integrations would be advantageous.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Zimbra Collaboration allows deployment on-premise or in private clouds, offering control over data, which is appealing for specific privacy needs. Google Workspace, being cloud-based, provides quick deployment with minimal maintenance. Its customer service is often praised for reliability, contributing to a positive user experience.

Pricing and ROI: Zimbra Collaboration is more cost-effective, attracting budget-conscious businesses or those with existing infrastructure. Google Workspace, despite higher costs, offers strong ROI through its productivity features and seamless collaboration capabilities. This pricing structure is often justified by the efficiency and comprehensive solutions it provides.

To learn more, read our detailed Google Workspace vs. Zimbra Collaboration Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Google Workspace vs. Zimbra Collaboration

March 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Google Workspace

Ranking in Email Applications

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

101

Ranking in other categories

Wireless Email (2nd), Cloud Storage (6th), Content Collaboration Platforms (2nd)

Zimbra Collaboration

Ranking in Email Applications

5th

Average Rating

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Email Applications category, the mindshare of Google Workspace is 22.9%, down from 23.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zimbra Collaboration is 9.0%, down from 10.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Email Applications

Featured Reviews

Sunil-Nair

IT Manager at Universal Carpets & Rugs

Email collaboration and accessibility have improved team productivity

The valuable features include the email service, email updates, and Google Drive. People are given email access to Google Drive. The team can share manual files and work accordingly. They can access different teams from anywhere, collectively putting files, sharing them, and managing them. Additionally, the manufacturing product does not require any downgrades. It works fine and continuously for the last three or four years. Users can access their emails from anywhere in their browser without a laptop or can directly access from Gmail. This is helpful for salespeople.

Read full review

Muhammad Talha Baig

Business Analyst and Associate Project Manager at SAMI Pharmaceuticals

One of the premium features was customized rooms tailored to the collaboration needs

Zimbra's strength lies in its individuality, and it should focus on leveraging its unique features rather than trying to emulate competitors. My organization has certified Zimbra technicians, so we believe we can utilize Zimbra certification. However, I was recently informed by Zimbra that no such certification exists. I have recently completed the test kit, and after the training, I will gain access to tickets. Therefore, if any clients are experiencing issues, we have a certified technical team available to provide support 24/7. This is how we can cater to our client's needs. I recommend Zimbra to small-scale and enterprise customers. Anyone, even those with 5 users, can opt for Zimbra. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The features of Google Workspace that significantly improve our work include real-time collaboration on documents, dynamic email for easy suggestions and approvals, integration with BigQuery for data analysis, seamless document sharing and storage in Google Drive, and advanced calendaring capabilities."

"It is quite a useful tool. It allows many people to work on a document. You can actually provide review comments and tag anybody to make the comment changes. You can also attach a document in Google Chat."

"There are several online forums and a lot of support materials online."

"The solution is very intuitive."

"All the Microsoft Office features are available in Google Workspace."

"G Suite Enterprise is scalable."

"Google Workspace is an excellent tool for communicating with people, which allows users to collaborate and edit files simultaneously."

"I think it is a great subscription for me. I think it is important, especially when making an internal email subscription. For example, I can easily create my colleague's email address, and we can use it. I benefited from G Suite. I am using the G Suite Drive, which provides 30GB of storage, and it is helping for me. I think it's better for me."

More Google Workspace pros

"The most valuable feature of Zimbra Collaboration is the cost."

"A lot of other products like Microsoft Exchange offer email or collaboration features, but they are not as fast as Zimbra."

"The stability is good and keeps getting better with each new update."

"The product is easy to set up."

"Zimbra Collaboration has a good web interface."

"Zimbra Collaboration's best feature is its compatibility with Microsoft's ActiveSync protocol, which allows users to use Outlook on Windows or MacOS."

"The configuration is simple."

"Zimbra Collaboration is light to manage. It works on the Linux operating system, which is far better to manage than Microsoft Windows. Microsoft Exchange works only on the Windows server. We prefer working on the Linux server for security reasons and ease of management. Zimbra Collaboration also has some integrated tools for security. It some modules to fight malware. These modules are not very powerful but are still doing a great job. Microsoft Exchange doesn't have a basic module. You have to purchase a security solution and add it to the solution. The cost of Zimbra Collaboration is one more reason for liking it. It is also very simple to migrate from Zimbra Collaboration to another email solution."

More Zimbra Collaboration pros

Cons

"In Google Meet, there is no feature for recording a meeting. It should have a feature for recording."

"Integration with Microsoft Outlook could be improved."

"Scalability is not as good as we would like."

"The tool should improve its on-prem capabilities to include people who are working offline. The pricing is also a challenge for both the Indian and overseas markets. The tool has a cap of 300 licenses. The product's price has also increased by 10 percent. Businesses are struggling to justify the ROI. Users cannot block emails unless they have a strong firewall."

"The solution is not user-friendly and it doesn't integrate that well with Microsoft Office, which is one of the bigger business apps on the market, compared to Google Sheets and applications of that sort."

"When I compare with Office 365, G Suite has fewer features."

"Everything is online, so you don't have a client on your desk. Working on email is online work, so can't do work offline and go back online. Sometimes it's not so intuitive. If you answer an email, it puts your answer at the bottom of the existing email."

"The solution could improve the Google Cloud identity login to laptops that sometimes do not work. The collaboration for Google sites, they are not equivalent to others, such as Sharepoint."

More Google Workspace cons

"The support was lacking in my experience. However, recently the support I received was good. Perhaps they have improved."

"There are some security issues."

"Zimbra should provide a desktop client. Right now, we are using a web browser for accessing our emails. There should also be a desktop client."

"Some issues cause the solution not to function correctly or to cause downtime once a month."

"The product must be more customizable."

"It is good and competent, but you have to pay for video and group chat features."

"The solution’s forums don't have much information or documentation on administration tasks."

"Zimbra Collaboration does not have a solution roadmap as aggressive as the new collaboration mail solutions. Additionally, they can have a better interface and integration with single sign-on."

More Zimbra Collaboration cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is reasonable."

"The pricing is a bit on the higher side than normal. For a basic Google account it costs $100, but Enterprise is %150."

"I give the pricing an eight out of ten, with ten being the most affordable."

"Approximately $6 per user, per month."

"The pricing is comparable, it's pretty decent."

"I can't recall the exact pricing per user for Google Workspace, but I know it's not that expensive. I'm in a mid-sized company that's able to maintain and afford Google Workspace, so it has competitive pricing, and I would rate its price as four out of five."

"We pay on yearly basis."

"Pricing is something concerning. We find the solution very expensive."

More Google Workspace pricing and cost advice

"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the price a four"

"If you choose the network edition, it is a little pricier. They have the open-source edition too which is only community supported."

"The solution is competitively priced."

"The price of the solution is low."

"Zimbra Collaboration offers a good price-to-feature ratio."

"I use Zimbra Collaboration's community version. We may move to the enterprise version since prices are affordable."

"When it comes to the licensing of Zimbra Collaboration, my license covers the servers and I find its terms to be much simpler than those of Microsoft Exchange."

"We pay yearly licenses for Zimbra Collaboration."

More Zimbra Collaboration pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

Educational Organization

Comms Service Provider

Computer Software Company

19%

Government

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Google Workspace?

Easy-to-build forms are allowing me to get feedback and information from my internal teams as well as from the customers very efficiently with the result data in structured manner.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Workspace?

I'm not satisfied with the cost because I feel these services should be free as they use our data.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Google Workspace?

As far as Google Workspace is concerned, it is working fine for us. Our needs are fulfilled, so that's fine. However, integration with Microsoft Outlook could be improved. The new integration was i...

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How does Zimbra Collaboration compare with Microsoft Exchange?

Zimbra is a free, open source collaborative software suite. The features I like best are the ease of integration and the email, calendar, and collaboration server with web interface. In addition, I...

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What do you like most about Zimbra Collaboration?

The most valuable feature of Zimbra for our team's productivity is its efficiency in handling email communication.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zimbra Collaboration?

The solution is competitively priced.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Exchange Online vs Google Workspace

Compared 29% of the time

Amazon WorkMail vs Google Workspace

Compared 29% of the time

ProtonMail vs Google Workspace

Compared 8% of the time

Amazon WorkDocs vs Google Workspace

Compared 4% of the time

Google Cloud Storage vs Google Workspace

Compared 2% of the time

More Google Workspace Competitors

Microsoft Exchange vs Zimbra Collaboration

Compared 31% of the time

Open-Xchange vs Zimbra Collaboration

Compared 20% of the time

KerioConnect vs Zimbra Collaboration

Compared 16% of the time

IceWarp vs Zimbra Collaboration

Compared 8% of the time

HCL Domino vs Zimbra Collaboration

Compared 4% of the time

More Zimbra Collaboration Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Google Workspace

March 2025

Download Google Workspace product report

Buyer's Guide

Zimbra Collaboration

March 2025

Download Zimbra Collaboration product report

Also Known As

G-Suite Enterprise, G-Suite, Google Apps for Business, G Suite Basic, G Suite Business, G-Suite Basic, G-Suite Business, Google Vault

No data available

Overview

Similar to G Suite, all Google Workspace plans provide a custom email for your business and include collaboration tools like Gmail, Calendar, Meet, Chat, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, Sites, and more.

As we’ve evolved G Suite into a more integrated experience across our communication and collaboration tools, we’ve rebranded to Google Workspace to more accurately represent the product vision.

Google

Zimbra Collaboration provides administrators and their end users innovative features that solve the challenges faced by organizations using today's legacy communications infrastructure.

Zimbra

Sample Customers

There are over five million businesses that use Google Apps for Business worldwide. Some key customers include The Roche Group, National Geographic, American Red Cross, City of Los Angeles, Flight Centre, and Konica Minolta.

NEC Biglobe, City of Ventura, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Hola Publishing, BIG, Sleepwell, LaFayette College, Xmission, DNA, Ring Line, Future Group, TIGC

Buyer's Guide

Google Workspace vs. Zimbra Collaboration

March 2025

Free Report: Google Workspace vs. Zimbra Collaboration

Find out what your peers are saying about Google Workspace vs. Zimbra Collaboration and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.

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