What is ON the line?
Deciding which SharePoint intranet is right for you can be a hard decision. Both Online SharePoint and On Premise SharePoint have very similar features but can differ in numerous ways. Code A Site decided to provide an easy breakdown of Online and On Premise SharePoint to make choosing your intranet environment easy.
Where, Oh Where, is my SharePoint
As you can tell by their names, SharePoint Online is located in the cloud where as On Premise SharePoint is installed at your company location. On Premise SharePoint is located within the corporate network and the company will need to use an IT Support Team to maintain the SharePoint farm. The IT Support Team is responsible for applying Microsoft patches and updates. In comparison, SharePoint Online sites reside in the Microsoft Data Centre. There is no need to have an IT Support Team on hand and Microsoft applies patches and updates regularly. Another aspect of On Premise SharePoint that users need to consider is that On Premise also takes up more physical space. Therefore, smaller companies find SharePoint Online more suitable for their needs.
Still wondering which is right for you?
In this paragraph we will break down the Pros and Cons of SharePoint Online. Intranet software developers designed SharePoint Online to integrate with Office 365 which makes it very easy to share information across systems. Without need for an IT Support Team, the online version will easily fit your budget. Another reason why SharePoint online can be suitable for smaller companies is that you can “pay as you go” instead of buying the On Premise SharePoint in one package. However, the online version may present more difficulty with platform integration. Cons that come with the cloud version of SharePoint is that there are limited customization, possible storage costs, and no server access.
As mentioned earlier a con that comes with On Premise SharePoint is that is does take up more physical space and your company will need to have an IT Team for maintenance. A few other cons are: additional geographic redundancy costs, the need for a team to patch servers/farms and extra configurations for external collaboration. However, some pros of On Premise include: control performance, the ability to scale up and scale down, reduction of bandwidth requirements and it is fully customizable.
Overall both SharePoint environments are great intranet solutions. Both systems work with Office 365 enabling collaboration across a corporation. The main difference between the two is that On Premise will require more space physically and metaphorically due to its need for an IT/maintenance team.
I know what I want!
Does SharePoint Online seem like the right fit for your company? Have questions about On Premise vs Online SharePoint environments? Give us a call or send us an email! If you want to learn more about SharePoint intranet check out our articles.
