We are frequently asked what collaboration platform will best meet the needs of a small organization. Google Apps is an increasingly popular choice because it has such low infrastructure requirements, and the feature set is very attractive. Small nonprofits and educational organizations receive for free some features that businesses usually have to pay for. But the basic functionality is available for free even to for-profit entities.

Microsoft Exchange is also popular because of the rich functionality it offers, and because so many are familiar with the features of Outlook in an Exchange environment. For instance, shared calendars and contact folders, etc. easy integration with mobile devices, and seamless synchronization of data on the Web, in Outlook.

After examining the features, I can say that Google Apps and Microsoft Exchange are very similar in the features they offer. Exchange does offer some features that simply cannot be replicated in Google Apps. On the other hand, I don’t think Google Apps offers anything you don’t get with Exchange (except a lower price tag).

So when choosing a communication and collaboration platform for your organization, it comes down to those few things which Google Apps does not do at all, or doesn’t do as well as Exchange.

To summarize the differences:
Microsoft Exchange permits fine grained delegation of access to other users for email, calendar, contacts, tasks and notes. Google Apps only permits sharing of calendar information (unless you give others your password, which grants them full access to your account). If you use Google Apps but prefer Outlook for email, calendar, contacts, etc you must still log in to the web to access another users’ shared calendar.

Microsoft Exchange supports the concept of shared folders. You can create folders for email, calendars, shared contact folders, plus notes and tasks. Google Apps permits shared calendars and that’s it.

Microsoft Exchange has better support for mobile devices than does Google Apps. The main issue is that if you send an item from Google Apps, it is not available on your handheld (depending on your platform), and vice versa. Items deleted from Google Apps must independently be deleted on the handheld. Items read on the handheld still show as unread in Google Apps and vice versa. Exchange supports remote wipe of handheld devices (Blackberry and Windows Mobile) while Google Apps does not. Also using multiple synchronization tools with Google Apps can result in duplication of items (syncing Google Calendar with both Outlook and a Blackberry, for instance).

Microsoft Exchange syncs contacts between Outlook and the Web. Google Apps does not, although you can work around this by synchronizing with a handheld device attached to a computer by a cable. It’s also worth mentioning that for organizations without a well developed customer database, the Contacts functionality in Outlook is far superior to the Google Apps address book.

My judgement is that Google Apps is a fine solution for organizations on a tight budget, which have a limited need to delegate access to information, who already have a good way to share contact records throughout the organization, and can put up with the limited support for mobile devices.

This analysis does not compare the costs of Google Apps with Microsoft Exchange. The Standard and Education editions of Google Apps are free, with the Premier edition carrying a flat per-user per-year fee. Microsoft Exchange can either be rented month to month from a hosting company or set up on your own hardware, which carries its own risks and costs. Conventional wisdom is that it is cheaper to rent Exchange access unless the organization has over 20 staff, at which point the costs become very similar. Although nonprofit organizations may be an exception since they can obtain Microsoft software at such low cost via TechSoup.org.

Microsoft Exchange and Google Apps Compared