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

Office 365 vs Symphony comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Office 365
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
152
Ranking in other categories
Content Collaboration Platforms (1st)
Symphony
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Social Software (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Messaging and Collaboration solutions, they serve different purposes. Office 365 is designed for Content Collaboration Platforms and holds a mindshare of 8.5%, up 6.8% compared to last year.
Symphony, on the other hand, focuses on Enterprise Social Software, holds 3.6% mindshare, down 8.2% since last year.
Content Collaboration Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Office 3658.5%
Google Workspace7.9%
Dropbox Business - Enterprise7.7%
Other75.9%
Content Collaboration Platforms
Enterprise Social Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Symphony3.6%
Slack Business - Enterprise9.6%
Microsoft Teams6.9%
Other79.9%
Enterprise Social Software
 

Featured Reviews

BasilJiji - PeerSpot reviewer
System engineer at a retailer with 10,001+ employees
Collaboration has transformed how our teams work and Copilot now drives faster daily decisions
The interface for the security and compliance center could be simplified. It changes frequently, which can make it somewhat difficult for admins to stay up-to-date on where specific settings are located. The compliance center modification or improvement of Office 365 needs to be introduced. The rest of the features feel acceptable to me. The reason it is not a ten is because of the complexity of managing the vast array of admin settings, which requires a specialized IT team. Even though it meets industry standards for decent security compliance such as SOC and HIPAA, the complexity of managing the admin settings needs to improve.
Nenad Pejcic - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Professional Services Engineer at Aspire Technology
Makes tasks like network planning and performance monitoring much easier
I have experience with solutions from other vendors like Nokia, Huawei, and Tyson. The main pros of Symphony, in comparison, are the modules that provide a comprehensive overview and the automation features for planning data. These aspects are notably beneficial and stand out. On the downside, the major cons revolve around user customization. Unlike other vendors where you can create your reports and customize navigation, Symphony's user optimization in the SCAP module is limited. This lack of flexibility is a significant drawback, especially when compared to other solutions. Overall, while certain modules like those related to SolarWinds are straightforward and comparable, Symphony falls short in terms of user customization.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Deployment went very smoothly even in its infancy."
"The most valuable and useful tool for us is Teams because we can make video calls and share data in a simple way."
"It's a complete package for any office to use."
"It's easy to expand and add new things like Google Docs and new PowerPoints."
"The most valuable feature is the integration with OneDrive, which has allowed us, a small business, easy access to a cloud environment, with no need to back up the data from five different computers."
"The most valuable feature of Office 365 is automatic saving, because if something happens on the computer your work is saved."
"It is an excellent, stable solution for doing what we do in our business."
"Provided us with better capability to trace emails, and provide security over those emails."
"The solution is user-friendly, and it is very good security-wise."
"Symphony and Laravel are the most comfortable frameworks for any developer. It is also lightweight."
"The entire product is good, and the number of available features justifies its cost."
"The overall functions are good."
"The entire product is good."
"I found the RAM Commander module in Symphony to be the most valuable."
 

Cons

"If two people update the same file, it causes issues."
"I haven't tried working with Copilot within Office 365; it's good, but native ChatGPT and Google Gemini are better."
"Setup is bit difficult."
"The pricing is not very reasonable as it could benefit from being more flexible."
"The price is getting more and more expensive."
"The issue arises when I need to ask Microsoft directly for support, and I have had delays, such as with a SharePoint issue that took two weeks to resolve, and another instance where the ticket was mishandled and sent to the wrong queue, which delayed the response even further."
"In terms of disadvantages in Office 365, the cost is something some people complain about because I live in South Africa and it is quoted in dollars."
"Office 365 could be easier to use at first. Tutorials are needed to know how to use the solution."
"The solution is very expensive, and its pricing could be improved."
"The area that needs to be improved is modular asset management. When we are uploading the assets in bulk, it is not aligned."
"To improve the situation, enhancing the functionality for integrating with other applications and addressing ticketing issues is crucial."
"The solution needs to improve CI."
"Compared to established vendors, it lacks user flexibility and customization, especially in the PM module."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Most of the time, we purchase Microsoft Exchange licenses, which are less expensive and provide only an email platform and 50 gigabytes of email storage for free."
"Good reporting and good value subscriptions for international calls."
"Licensing, billing, and accounting are available from the management interface."
"The price of Office 365 is very expensive."
"Licensing fees are paid on a monthly basis, or we prepay them."
"We have a license to use this solution. We have an E3 license which covers many different solutions."
"I would rate the solution 3 out of 5 for the price. I think Microsoft presents a good solution concerning the price."
"The pricing is not really high, but one can get the software with the license key for free."
"It is fairly an expensive product, but works for us."
"It's a costly product, but the number of available features justifies it."
"Symphony is expensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Content Collaboration Platforms solutions are best for your needs.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
49%
Comms Service Provider
5%
Media Company
5%
Retailer
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business62
Midsize Enterprise31
Large Enterprise70
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Office 365?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Office 365 is that it is moderate.
What needs improvement with Office 365?
Office 365 could be improved or enhanced in some ways. It would be better if it were more simple to find the points, or sometimes there are so many possible configurations that it makes you confuse...
What is your primary use case for Office 365?
Teams and Outlook are important for us, and Teams is central to our operations. I utilize Power Automate for streamlining repetitive tasks in our organization, but not for large tasks. For tasks su...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Microsoft Office 365, Office 365 Enterprise, Office 365 Enterprise E1, Office 365 Enterprise E3, Office 365 Enterprise E5, Office 365 ProPlus, Office 365 Business, Office 365 Business Essentials, Office 365 Business Premium, Office 365 F1
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Me & the Bees Lemonade
BNP Paribas, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Citi, Credit Suisse, JP Morgan Chase
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Google, Dropbox and others in Content Collaboration Platforms. Updated: June 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.