Posted by: Tavis Patterson on November 30, 2021 at 11:51 am
Microsoft announced a price increase for their Office 365 and Microsoft 365 services. While this pricing only affects commercial and business accounts users, this is the first time that Microsoft has changed its prices in a decade. There are no changes to personal or educational plans yet but with this change, it can be expected that in the near future they will become more expensive as well. The new pricing goes into effect on March 1st, 2022. We decided to write about this topic in particular so that you can plan ahead for the changes.
New changes are as follows:
- Microsoft 365 Business Basic (from $5 to $6 per user)
- Microsoft 365 Business Premium (from $20 to $22)
- Office 365 E1 (from $8 to $10)
- Office 365 E3 (from $20 to $23)
- Office 365 E5 (from $35 to $38)
- Microsoft 365 E3 (from $32 to $36)
The price increase does not seem like much but for businesses that have many accounts, it can be costly. Larger businesses can benefit from bulk discounts and deals, leaving small businesses to feel the effects most. This was to be expected though, Microsoft has added more than 20 apps to Office 365 since it first launched. With all the added support and popularity of the Office suite, you can expect the prices in every plan to increase soon. With these price increases, you can certainly expect Microsoft to increase these plans on average every year or two.
This post was not written to persuade you away from Office 365, in fact, we strongly recommend staying with Microsoft. Instead, this was an update, letting business owners know that their prices will increase in March and to plan accordingly. We always highly recommend every business owner set an IT spending budget each year and make sure that it increases from year to year to keep up with any technology changes. This allows for your business to stay relevant in today’s highly competitive market. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to info@taznetworks.com.