Microsoft Teams Essentials is a standalone version of Teams, specifically designed for small businesses. Previously, customers had to subscribe to at least Microsoft 365 Business Basic in order to have Teams.

With Teams Essentials offered at an affordable price, SMB customers can work, collaborate, and be more productive. Teams Essentials is the most competitive online meeting and collaboration solution on the market today.

What’s great about Teams Essentials is that it works with the customer’s existing email and calendar system unlike the version of Teams included in Microsoft 365 Business or Enterprise plans: whether it’s an on-premises Exchange Server or hosted, Gmail or other email systems.

Microsoft Teams has been around for a long time as a free version. Teams Essentials adds options to cater to small businesses that may need different features and enhanced support that aren’t available for free.

Comparison between the free version of Microsoft Teams and Teams Essentials:

Whichever tier best suits your client, Teams Essentials offers a very competitive alternative to Zoom. If your customer needs more than what the free version of Zoom includes, the first pricing option is $20 per user/month compared to Teams Essentials’ $5.10.

Using Teams Essentials will get your SMB customers familiar with Microsoft cloud services. This will help them when they are ready to migrate their email, storage, and Office applications to Microsoft 365 Business.

Teams Essentials offers a complete Teams experience without deploying the full Microsoft 365 suite and allows you to open opportunities by adding, for example, Teams Phone system and calling plans.

For more information, feel free to contact us!