No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Google Workspace vs Zarafa comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 25, 2026

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
6.6
Number of Reviews
106
Ranking in other categories
Wireless Email (1st), Cloud Storage (7th), Content Collaboration Platforms (2nd)
Zarafa
Ranking in Email Applications
16th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Email Applications category, the mindshare of Google Workspace is 15.9%, down from 21.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zarafa is 1.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Email Applications Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Google Workspace15.9%
Zarafa1.7%
Other82.4%
Email Applications
 

Featured Reviews

AR
Assosiate Professor at Palazzo del Mediterraneo
Collaborative work with students has improved but storage limitations and support issues remain
We have Google Workspace, and we use it primarily for Drive to collect items. We categorize folders with topics and material either for students or for research. We use Google Doc to share documents, especially when we assign homework to be corrected for peer correction or classroom correction. With Teams and Microsoft, we use it for collective calls and exam supervision because we use video surveillance through camera with Teams. We use Teams for meetings and to share material with students. The ability to share documents with students and assign them things and correct them in real time has been beneficial. You can verify what they write, and they can contribute and cooperate to create a collective document, which is something that our society nowadays requires. The ability to cooperate, especially those who work with languages and those who work with writing, need to learn how to cooperate. There is co-editing and co-writing, all these sorts of things. I love the fact that I can easily have access to folders that I can categorize and where I can upload research material and teaching material.
it_user302112 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant IT Infrastructure at a tech consulting company with 51-200 employees
Our customers are able to use this groupware solution to connect to Active Directory and OpenLDAP, although Postgres support would be an improvement.
Zarafa has several very valuable features, among them a very good Outlook-like web interface. Furthermore, ZPush for talking between ActiveSync and mobile devices is a valuable asset. In addition, one is able to connect via Outlook and the exchange protocol to Zarafa. This makes Zarafa a free, and working, alternative to Microsoft Exchange.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Good search features, reliable storage, and quick thinking."
"Users can work anywhere with an internet connection."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is email."
"G-Suite is a costly investment, but it is better than other solutions in terms of features, functions, usability, and uptime."
"G Suite is a completely different experience, and its capabilities are more advanced."
"This solution has everything you need; it's got search features, it's got reliable storage, card features, it's got quick thinking, it's awesome."
"I like everything that Google does. They have good products."
"The most valuable feature of Google Workspace is the sheets and documents."
"This makes Zarafa a free, and working, alternative to Microsoft Exchange."
 

Cons

"Based on my experience, the technical support is extremely poor. Even as a technical person, I struggle to find appropriate contact numbers or email addresses."
"They can maybe improve its graphical user interface. Google is not really known for having a PC interface. It is just a nice-to-have feature."
"It would be nice to have additional software, such as Microsoft Teams, since our basic edition, Google Meet, cannot record video."
"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."
"Customer Service: It's non-existent."
"Google Workspace does a pretty good job, so it doesn't have that much room for improvement, but what would make it even better is if its apps, for example, Gmail, could integrate with more apps, such as Evernote and specific cloud-based platforms."
"Google Mail's spam filter needs improvement. If I'm sending mail to another email user, sometimes it goes to the spam folder, and they won't know unless they check because they aren't seeing it in the primary inbox. They may miss important emails. At the same time, I'm receiving spam that shouldn't go to my inbox."
"It glitches a lot because it still operates under the browser."
"Not really, although the Zarafa-index component was using a lot of memory and disk I/O bandwith."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price per client within the business is too high."
"The pricing is comparable, it's pretty decent."
"Approximately $6 per user, per month."
"It's about $8.30 up a user per month."
"The pricing is very high, although I cannot tell if this is the result of the Indian vendors artificially inflating it."
"The price of the solution can vary."
"There are several areas where a G Suite implementation can reduce costs: lower license fees than some competing products, reduced hardware, and IT support costs."
"The main challenge regarding startups with identity services is you could be on a platform that works well but the services are expensive. For example, Microsoft Azure costs approximately $30 per user which is expensive. You end up choosing a different platform, such as G Suite Enterprise because it is priced reasonably and is less expensive than other solutions."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Email Applications solutions are best for your needs.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business64
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise29
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Google Workspace?
The company made the decision to migrate, so I'm not sure why specifically. The company is moving the data and the Microsoft subscription is no longer continued, so I have the choice to use Google ...
What needs improvement with Google Workspace?
Before I was in a Microsoft environment, which had its own software that was not website-based. When I moved to Google Workspace, it was not seamless because I have to access it through a web view ...
What is your primary use case for Google Workspace?
I have been using Google Workspace for file organizing, including Google Drive, Spreadsheet, Gmail, and Google Form, with most of my usage being in Spreadsheet. I do use Google Groups, which combin...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

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

 

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.
Tivoli, InterAkt Contour, Riagg Rijnmond, Lammerink, Revell, KMP, International School of the Hague
Find out what your peers are saying about Google, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and others in Email Applications. Updated: August 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.