Utterly confused, what to choose when it comes to SharePoint On-premises and SharePoint Online? Are you looking for comparisons between the two platforms? Well, you have come to the right place!
To clear your doubts and help in decision making, this blog will explain basic differences between SharePoint On-premises and SharePoint Online.
However, before discussing the differences, here is one thing I would like to share. From past few years, SharePoint Online has become more powerful because of its cloud ability. SharePoint Online provides security and reliability which is excellent. Isn’t it a great relief to know that your data is well-protected on-site? Also, with its additional hybrid capabilities it is like to fit in any kind of environment.
Let us have a look at the major differences –
Resources
It is essential to focus on how much you can afford in terms of resources, especially when it comes to cloud and On-premises. This is because for SharePoint On-premises, you would need extra space and resources (IT team) to maintain the server, i.e. more people and extra infrastructure. Whereas with SharePoint Online, there is a minimal staff requirement and no hardware cost resulting in the desired productivity.
If you have an On-premises platform then all of the updates and patches to the server would be done by the IT team available at your end. Where in case of SharePoint Online, all of the major updates are automatically done by Microsoft itself.
Cost
While choosing any platform, businesses importantly think about cost. If you are planning to opt for SharePoint On-premises then you will have to invest into hardware, its maintenance, license and much more. On the other hand, SharePoint Online being the subset of Office 365, is billed for every month according to the user.
Core capabilities and Microsoft Master Data Services (MDS)
Compliances and information security also plays a major role in decision making. The On-premises environment is majorly dependent upon your core system capabilities and gives you complete control over compliances and other related information whereas SharePoint Online is dependent on the Microsoft’s built-in redundancy for data centers but there is no scope for backups and data recovery for end users.
Development
Considering the On-premise, full trust solutions can be easily deployed which consist of farm features such as site collections, web applications or whole farm public facing sites with lot of customizations. Conversely for SharePoint Online, full trust solution deployment is not possible. Deployment of only Sandbox solution is possible consisting of features like site collection and public facing sites; that too not with customizations.
It doesn’t matter what solution you are planning to use, what matters is accurate analysis before coming to a decision. It is also vital to back up your data, irrespective of the solution you choose.
Note: Backing up your data on cloud is much simpler process with a third party solution as it helps you take backup automatically. This can helpful in cases where there is a data loss.
If you know any other difference between SharePoint Online and On-premises, feel free to share with us.