Google Workspace (formerly G Suite)

G Suite Basic vs Business

Wondering if you should choose G Suite Basic or Business? You’re not alone. Many solopreneurs, startups, and small businesses looking for an inexpensive plan are drawn to these two options, which are some of the most competitively priced plans on the market.

Let’s compare G Suite Business vs Basic briefly to help you decide which is best for you. And remember, if you have questions or want to talk through your options, our certified pros are ready to help, just contact us.

File Storage: A Key Difference Between G Suite Business and Basic Plans

The size of your team and how many user licenses you need will determine in large part which plan is right for you. One of the key differences between G Suite’s Basic and Business plan is the amount of cloud storage available.

If your business or your team members will need a lot of storage for emails, image and video files, presentations, and more, then you should plan to buy 5 or more G Suite Business licenses. When you do this, everyone will receive unlimited cloud storage for just $12 per user, per month. This is an incredible value that you won’t find anywhere other than with G Suite storage.

Search & eDiscovery: A Key Advantage for Most Businesses

When comparing the G Suite Business and G Suite Basic plans, the other key difference between plans is the availability of search, eDiscovery, and auditing features included for just $12 per user, per month in the G Suite Business plan.

Most businesses find Smart Search and Cloud Search to be incredibly valuable which make their team more efficient, and the ability to retain and search email and chat records is a great feature should you ever need to reference those for quality assurance or legal reasons.

Do You Need G Suite Business, or is the Basic Package Enough?

There’s a lot to like about the G Suite Basic plan, starting with its price ($6 per user), and its flexibility (this per user fee is paid on a monthly basis with no annual contract).

G Suite Basic, as the name suggests, will offer you all of the basic features you need from a professional office suite, including business email through Gmail, shared calendars, video and voice conferencing, apps to create documents, spreadsheets and presentations, and security and admin controls. You’ll also receive 24/7 support (phone, email, online) and 30GB of cloud storage per user.

Depending upon how your business works, this entry-level amount of cloud storage space may not be sufficient, which is why we encourage many businesses to consider upgrading to the Business package, where unlimited cloud storage becomes an option for just $12 per user, per month.

It’s worth saying, though, that the 30GB cloud storage limit does not include any of your Google Docs, Google Sheets, Google Slides, etc. Your inbox, image and video files, etc. will count toward the cloud storage limit in G Suite Basic. If you do a lot of photo and video editing, you will probably want to upgrade to the Business or Enterprise G Suite plans.

Still trying to decide what’s right for you? Contact Us. We’ll ask you some questions about your business goals and needs and steer you in the right direction. We can even set you up with a free, 14-day trial with support from our team to make sure you experience all of the great features of G Suite.