Microsoft Announces Teams Essentials for Small Businesses

Microsoft will offer a standalone version of Teams for small businesses, called Teams Essentials, for $4 per user per month.

“Today we’re excited to introduce Microsoft Teams Essentials,” Microsoft corporate vice president Jared Spataro revealed. “It’s the first standalone offering of Microsoft Teams designed specifically with small businesses in mind. It brings together features small businesses need to serve customers, including unlimited group video calls for up to 30 hours, group chat, file sharing, and calendaring. And at only $4 USD per user per month, it’s the most affordable all-in-one solution in the market today.”

Teams Essentials expands on the capabilities of the free version of Microsoft Teams by offering features like longer meetings and more storage. Meetings can last up to 30 hours and customers can host up to 300 people at once. And Teams Essentials offers 10 GB of file storage per user, double available in the free version of Teams.

Teams Essentials also offers some interesting partner hooks, leading me to wonder whether this solution isn’t at least partially a subtle response to the growing antitrust complaints about Microsoft bundling teams with Microsoft 365. That is, you will be able to purchase Teams Essentials from a variety of Microsoft Cloud Partners as well as directly from Microsoft.

Microsoft also notes that individuals who wish to use Microsoft Teams for personal use can get access to the same Teams Essentials features with a Microsoft 365 Family or Personal subscription.

You can learn more about Teams essentials, and how it compares to the other versions of Teams, from the Microsoft webite.