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Microsoft 365 vs. Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued) vs. Proofpoint Email Protection

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Microsoft 365

    Score8.7 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft 365 (formerly Office 365) is a Microsoft Cloud subscription service that includes Microsoft Office products (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Publisher, and Access). The software can be installed across multiple devices and ensures that users always have the most up-to-date version of the included Office applications.

    $5

    Per User Per Month

    Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)

    Score8.7 out of 10
    N/AMicrosoft Office 2016 is the familiar suite of Office products including applications such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint for use on a single PC or Mac. The 2016 is no longer available for sale from Microsoft, and support is at an end since 2020.N/A

    Proofpoint Email Protection

    Score8.3 out of 10
    N/AProofpoint Email Protection is available as an on-premise or cloud based solution and blocks unwanted, malicious and impostor emails with granular search capabilities and visibility into all messages. Outbound controls include encryption and data loss prevention, while continuity capabilities ensure business communications can continue as normal in the event of an email outage. With Proofpoint's Email Protection, you can protect your people, data, and brand from today’s threats…N/A
    Pricing
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Editions & Modules
    Business Basic
    $5.00
    Per User Per Month
    Individual
    $5.84
    *Per Month
    Business - Apps
    $8.25
    Per User Per Month
    Enterprise - F3
    $10.00
    Per User Per Month
    Business Standard
    $12.50
    Per User Per Month
    Business Premium
    $20.00
    Per User Per Month
    Enterprise - E3
    $32.00
    Per User Per Month
    Enterprise - E5
    $57.00
    Per User Per Month
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Free Trial
    NoNoYes
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional Details*When billed annually.——
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Considered Multiple Products
    Microsoft
    Chose Microsoft 365
    Microsoft Office 365 is more complete than Microsoft Office 2016. It is cloud-based, and this is a great advantage. Furthermore, now updates and upgrades are automatic and can be scheduled or accepted, really saving time compared to Office 2016.
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    No comparison, we can do more with Microsoft 365 and we are more efficient. The pricing model is very fair. We don't have to worry about updating the software on each machine, the updates are handled by Microsoft directly and the Microsoft 365 programs seem much more stable and …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    We had been using Microsoft Office for a long time, but moving to Microsoft 365 [(formerly Office 365)] was a game changer because it is a cloud based system. Having the ability to access your email, files, or whatever you need wherever you are from any device is what really …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    In our company we have both Office 365 and regular Office 2016. We are transitioning more to 365 for the ease of managing the licensing. We don't have to keep license cards or numbers stored anywhere because 365 uses your microsoft login which you are using anyway.
    Compared to …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    We were looking to stay in the Microsoft Office 365 family, so it was either the cloud or a current desktop version. Ultimately the lower startup cost of refreshing all licenses at once, it was decided by the board to go with the new subscription-based Microsoft Office 365. At …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    Microsoft Office 365 simply drives through the cloud platform allowing to set a huge variety of options that can be set from custom to standard software in a single package or just to set an specific range of options enabled to the end users, and given the chance to the company …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    Microsoft Office 365 is the easiest to access on the go and is always up to date. It is also affordable given all of the features it offers. Being able to use most of Microsoft's products for one price is convenient and allows our organization to store and sort information over …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    Having all of the offerings and services in one easy to use administrative interface makes administration of our Microsoft suite of applications much easier. We are not able to get that same integration with separated applications. Gmail is not very intuitive if you're coming …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft 365
    Google Apps made famous real-time collaborative editing in Google Docs. Now that Office 365 offers Word Online, there is no competition. Google Apps have always been "Microsoft Office-Lite" products, giving very basic functionality. With Office Online apps, it's hard not to see …
    Incentivized
    Discontinued Products
    Chose Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    For certain situations there is a benefit to the "standalone" package of Office 2106, vs. a subscription-based product like Office 365. Especially in the case where there are shared computers, or computers that are used as a kiosk, Microsoft Office 2016 would be one of the few …
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    We have not tried to use an alternate. Office is the way to go.
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    Microsoft Office provides the complete package. Everyone else is just a piece to the puzzle. Sure Microsoft Office costs more, but they give you all the software you need to have in one package. I don't want or need to find replacements for 5 different purposes.
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    Not as robust and feature filled as office 2016. Also missing a mail client like outlook that can be integrated with exchange. have not used any further applications besides this.
    Incentivized
    Chose Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    Microsoft Office 365 brings the same tools of Office 2016, but renewed. Office 2016 was sold for a one time, up front fee, on the other hand, Microsoft Office 365 is the new way Microsoft wants you to buy Office, you pay a monthly or yearly fee and get access to its latest …
    Incentivized
    Proofpoint
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Microsoft Office 365 Advanced Threat Protection needs to improve a lot to catch up to Proofpoint's abilities and features. We used ATP for a year but malicious emails were slipping through. Proofpoint was much more efficient in catching malicious emails. With ATP the …
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    As a previous Exchange administrator, ProofPoint allowed us to move many security-based mail flow rules into the system. This simplified our Exchange mail flow and allowed for more detailed and concise rules.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Works very well - probably much better in terms of feature set and customisability. The quality of message filtering is fantastic. But from an administrative perspective it is more difficult to manage than the others.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    We currently have Microsoft ATP turned on behind Proofpoint and Proofpoint's TAP. ATP almost never alerts us to any issues due to the filtering by Proofpoint.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Proofpoint is the leader of the pack when it comes to email security services. I have used a range of other providers in the space and Proofpoint is the best. It's ability to identify and block malicious email and threats sets it above all other competitors.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    It's definitely better and more robust and reliable than our previous solution (McAfee Email Gateway), but when compared to Mimecast they are pretty much on par. Both solutions offer a very good solution to email security.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    I have used Symantec Brightmail, Cisco Ironport, and Trend Micro Email Security.
    We selected Trend's product due to the price, but it failed miserably at clustering and overall email delivery. Proofpoint came in second as it checked off a lot of the boxes that we required in …
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Sandboxing, TAP, TRAP along with on-premise device and cloud capability.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    EOP (Exchange online protection)
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    We have not used any other product so far apart from Proofpoint.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    We didn't look at any other alternatives. Proofpoint reached out to us via cold call, the guys seemed really nice so we met with them for lunch and loved their showing of the product and in the end purchased it.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    I would trade it for Office 365 in a heartbeat.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Proofpoint gives you a better feature set, with more comprehensive tools, and much better visibility and reporting than you can get with an out of the box deployment of Office 365 Online protection. We needed more visibility into what was happening and why and that is something …
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Proofpoint > Microsoft Office 365 protection (we did not utilize 365 ATP).
    The tools within Microsoft Office365 are time-consuming to use and are in different locations in the portal. It was such a hassle trying to track threats.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    We used to rely on Google's Gmail built-in protection which is limited. For example, there is not much administration control around the spam filter and how it detects spam. We cannot make a custom rule or policy to handle spam. Proofpoint provides more control to the email …
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    This is the only product we have used.
    Incentivized
    Chose Proofpoint Email Protection
    Most recently we've looked at Microsoft's Email protection services associated with Office 365, but they are still not quite ready for prime time. Proofpoint's logging, search and threat analysis capabilities are literally years ahead of Microsoft in this product space. …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    96%
    Would buy again
    195 Answers
    93%
    Would buy again
    50 Answers
    100%
    Would buy again
    10 Answers
    Delivers good value for the price
    97%
    Delivers good value for the price
    179 Answers
    94%
    Delivers good value for the price
    47 Answers
    100%
    Delivers good value for the price
    8 Answers
    Happy with the feature set
    98%
    Happy with the feature set
    198 Answers
    96%
    Happy with the feature set
    52 Answers
    100%
    Happy with the feature set
    10 Answers
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    94%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    134 Answers
    98%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    40 Answers
    83%
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    5 Answers
    Implementation went as expected
    95%
    Implementation went as expected
    142 Answers
    98%
    Implementation went as expected
    41 Answers
    100%
    Implementation went as expected
    7 Answers
    Features
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Secure Email Gateway
    Comparison of Secure Email Gateway features of Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued) and Proofpoint Email Protection
    Feature
    Microsoft 365
    -
    Ratings
    Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)
    -
    Ratings
    Proofpoint Email Protection
    8.0
    79 Ratings
    5% below category average
    Anti-malware00 Ratings00 Ratings10.077 Ratings
    Customizability00 Ratings00 Ratings7.076 Ratings
    Data Loss Protection00 Ratings00 Ratings6.049 Ratings
    Threat Detection00 Ratings00 Ratings8.076 Ratings
    Sandboxing00 Ratings00 Ratings7.058 Ratings
    End-to-End Encryption00 Ratings00 Ratings10.059 Ratings
    Management Tools00 Ratings00 Ratings8.075 Ratings
    Best Alternatives
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Small Businesses
    Google Workspace
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Google Workspace
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Sophos Email
    Score8.9 out of 10
    Medium-sized Companies
    Google Workspace
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Google Workspace
    Score9.1 out of 10
    Barracuda ESG (discontinued)
    Score6.2 out of 10
    Enterprises
    Microsoft 365 Business Premium
    Score9 out of 10
    Microsoft 365 Business Premium
    Score9 out of 10
    Microsoft Exchange
    Score8.6 out of 10
    All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
    User Ratings
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Likelihood to Recommend
    8.4
    (262 ratings)
    7.5
    (64 ratings)
    10.0
    (96 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    9.5
    (6 ratings)
    5.0
    (3 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Usability
    8.7
    (30 ratings)
    7.0
    (3 ratings)
    9.0
    (3 ratings)
    Availability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    9.1
    (1 ratings)
    Performance
    -
    (0 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    8.9
    (54 ratings)
    8.0
    (45 ratings)
    8.3
    (5 ratings)
    Implementation Rating
    9.0
    (2 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    Product Scalability
    -
    (0 ratings)
    -
    (0 ratings)
    8.2
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Microsoft 365Microsoft Office 2016 (discontinued)Proofpoint Email Protection
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Microsoft
    Microsoft 365 would be well suited for medium to large enterprises. This is where there are several hundreds or thousands of people. Since most everyone has used one of the applications the learning curve would be reduced. Another reason would be the ability to implement security measures to prevent access to sensitive data. This could justify the cost of an Enterprise license.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    I'd recommend [Microsoft] Office2016 for any business that has more than a couple of users, as the software is very scalable from just a small business to a large enterprise corporation. I don't know of any case where it might not be appropriate, as even home users and students use the software suite as well.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    Well suited: Proofpoint does a pretty good job at protecting us from spam emails. I was able to block a lot of emails coming from SendGrid by blocking SendGrid emails with a custom spam filter. However, SendGrid has a lot of legit emails too so I was able to create another rule to allow those emails from certain people, then block the rest. That way business need was met but spam emails are blocked. Less Appropriate If you are trying to monitor internal to internal emails Proofpoint is probably a little over featured for that.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Pros
    Microsoft
    • Chat with teams and the integrations with the other apps, and many more smaller ones, like to-dos, news, and the recent Outlook integration.
    • Easy embedding on SharePoint to broadcast all the content created in the different tools.
    • The office package is still robust with the good things from the past and new additions.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Data manipulation. Excel takes the raw data we receive and allows us to digest it in ways that are useful to our business processes.
    • Communication. Outlook serves as our primary means of communication and setting up appointments.
    • Documentation. Word is the default standard when it comes to using a word processor and we are no different in this regard. Nearly every user has to use the application on a regular basis in order to accomplish their work.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    • Spam - catches these emails before hitting the inbox.
    • Daily digest - provides users with a list of the emails that were blocked and allows them to choose to release them if they are legitimate emails.
    • Ensures that emails coming into our organization is safe for our users and verifies the email is coming from stated senders email server.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Cons
    Microsoft
    • Slack is 1000x better than teams. Why put a 250 limit on a chat? Our company hasn't moved fully to channels and it's making us lose transparency. Plus, the teams channels we do have nobody is going to. 90% loss in visibility and engagement.
    • Teams for web meetings. I think the UI/UX should match Zoom which is the standard for all our customers. They don't like it when we use Teams.
    • Chats and Channels need to somehow be on one screen automatically without having to choose that view because majority of our company hasn't opened Teams Channels and only stays in chats.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Office 2016 professional edition can be priced for a single user license, it would be nice to see a drop in the pricing.
    • Office 2016 home edition is a better price but does not include outlook 2016, so it is not a good fit for the workplace environments.
    • Office 2016 can run slowly on older systems, so you need to make sure you have a machine that is 4 years old or less for it to run smoothly.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    • Proofpoint could offer more frequent training opportunities to customers at all levels of expertise.
    • Proofpoint can always continue to strive to keep its product a leader in the industry.
    • Proofpoint's support site could be overhauled to provide a more logical flow.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Likelihood to Renew
    Microsoft
    There are many features of Office that we cannot replicate in any other tool. Plus people know it already. It's not going away anytime soon.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    We believe that office 2016 offers the best value when it comes to features included out of the box. The software is used in its entirety by our organization and is easily supported by our staff of IT technicians. Users find this software to be easy to learn and easy to use with minimal learning curve.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    No answers on this topic
    Usability
    Microsoft
    Microsoft 365 is the gold standard for performing project tasks in a professional environment, enabling the quick transfer and exchange of files and ideas for team members who work locally and remotely. Its suite of tools is familiar and has evolved to being cloud based, allowing for files to be updated in real time from near and far.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    It's fairly easy to use, but the automatic formatting or capturing of formatting when pasting is wonky - especially when there are outlines or other bullets/numbered lists. Fixing and sizing up tables can be annoying, and there are sometimes formatting issues that we just absolutely cannot fix for some reason
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    Very robust and solid product in protecting our emails. The engineers who assisted with our implementation was very knowledgable and great to work with. Easy to use by end-users. Administration and management are also easy for IT. Great dashboard and reporting tools for business reviews.
    Read full review
    Reliability and Availability
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Proofpoint
    There were no appliance errors or unplanned outages during five years of operation.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Performance
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Proofpoint
    Most important thing is the performance of processing mails. Even in a complex environment the system keeps performing on a very high Level.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Support Rating
    Microsoft
    Over the past 8 years of using Microsoft 365, I have noticed that they change vendors often. This always leads to a poor experience in the beginning, then levels out after some time for the company to get things worked out. As a customer, it is really frustrating because I don't have time when something isn't working to have them "look into my issue" and get back with me. They have even closed a ticket I specifically told them to keep open. Your applications are only as good as the support.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    I am an MS feedback hub participant and they certainly don't pay enough attention to several bugs several people raise it in the portal. For the enterprise, it seems to me based on my prior experience that yes, they have a dedicated team to support operations. For mid to small companies or single users, it has been a struggle. So, you are pretty much with MS Blogs and others.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    We use ProofPoint support quite often to fix issues and assist with setting up features and rules. Each time we have created a ticket, they have been very helpful and respectful. Each ticket has been treated with the appropriate SLA time and attention. We also enjoy the regular check-ins from the engineers when tickets are open but we get busy with other tasks.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Implementation Rating
    Microsoft
    Everything works and I use it all the time.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Proofpoint
    No answers on this topic
    Alternatives Considered
    Microsoft
    Its very user-friendly, collaborative and efficient that boosts productivity using cloud tools. their security is strong and it provides data protection. There are regular updates that shields us from attackers too. It offers a wealth of learning resources, including tutorials, help articles and video guide to help users make the most of the application and personally upgrade their skills.
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    We use Microsoft Office 2016 because at the time it was the best tool for us, but now with full attention to cloud products, we may be thinking of migrating our solution to a cloud service.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    We previously used halon anti-spam, which lasted us well until our organization really started to grow and it was not able to keep up with the amount of mail we were receiving. The support is also nothing compared to Proofpoint's professional services offering. Halon was also not able to have the complex rules that Proofpoint can offer.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Scalability
    Microsoft
    No answers on this topic
    Discontinued Products
    No answers on this topic
    Proofpoint
    You can add a lot of agents to your environment if you need them. And you can operate hardware appliances and virtual appliances in the same cluster.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Return on Investment
    Microsoft
    • We have a lot of nonprofit users, so they have a good ROI.
    • I like the constant updates without having to purchase the software repeatedly.
    • I used to purchase each Office (insert year here) often, so the software was up to date and had the newest options and connectors. I think my return on investment would have been much better if Microsoft had updated those versions to keep them current; after all, we did pay for them.
    • Microsoft 365's offering a monthly fee or a discount for a year helps, and you can look at it as a free backup if you have everything set to back up to One Drive. (Cloud-based document filing you can access anywhere ( with an internet connection)—you Can't beat that!)
    Read full review
    Discontinued Products
    • Microsoft Office 2016 saves me a lot of time daily. I have functions and macros set up that calculate and show me a lot of things just from a couple of my inputs. This would take full days sometimes if not for that.
    • Apart from time, it saves me money, I manage data in Excel, I don't have to buy software specifically for that.
    • Sooner or later my company will have to switch to new edition, which will hurt revenues because of a subscription model.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    Proofpoint
    • Having easy-to-reach backups of all employee emails has made Proofpoint worth it by itself. That plus the countless times that spam/malicious emails did not make it through to the intended person that could have potentially cost the organization a lot of money.
    Incentivized
    Read full review
    ScreenShots