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Productivity · head to head

Microsoft 365 vs RowShare

Microsoft 365 logo

Microsoft 365

Productivity

Subscription bundle of the Office applications with mail, storage, meetings and organisational identity

From
$7/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
RowShare logo

RowShare

Productivity

Shared online table where each contributor sees only their own rows

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Microsoft 365 business plans are capped at 300 seats, so an organisation that grows past that must move to Enterprise plans, which changes both the price per user and the feature mix at the moment it can least afford a migration project.; RowShare it is a table rather than a spreadsheet, so the formula and analysis capability people expect from Excel is not there, and anything requiring modelling or charting has to be exported and finished elsewhere.
  • They diverge on capability: Microsoft 365 covers Office applications, RowShare covers Row-level permissions.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 30 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Microsoft 365 and RowShare actually diverge.

Attributes where Microsoft 365 and RowShare differ
AttributeMicrosoft 365RowShare
Starting price$7/monthOn request

Identical on both: pricing model (subscription), free tier (No), platforms (Web), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Productivity).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Microsoft 365

  • Office applications
  • Hosted services
  • Teams
  • Microsoft Entra ID
  • OneDrive storage
  • Device management and endpoint protection
  • Purview compliance
  • Copilot

Only in RowShare

  • Row-level permissions
  • Column-level permissions
  • Typed columns
  • Forms
  • Automatic reminders
  • Microsoft Teams integration
  • Zapier connections
  • Excel import and export

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Microsoft 365

  • Any organisation that wants mail, documents, meetings and identity from one supplier on one bill.not RowShare
  • A company standardising on single sign-on, where Entra ID becomes the account other services authenticate against.not RowShare
  • Regulated work that needs retention, legal hold and eDiscovery across mail and documents, provided the tier that includes them is actually bought.not RowShare
  • A household that needs installed Office applications on several machines rather than browser-only editing.not RowShare

RowShare

  • Collecting a recurring return such as timesheets, budget lines or stock counts where contributors must not see each other's entries.not Microsoft 365
  • Replacing an emailed spreadsheet that one person consolidates by hand at the end of every month.not Microsoft 365
  • A shared list where some columns belong to the contributor and others are only for the administrator.not Microsoft 365
  • A structured departmental table inside Microsoft Teams that does not warrant a full database or a heavier platform licence.not Microsoft 365

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Microsoft 365

  • Business plans are capped at 300 seats, so an organisation that grows past that must move to Enterprise plans, which changes both the price per user and the feature mix at the moment it can least afford a migration project.
  • The compliance capabilities most organisations eventually need, including retention, data loss prevention, advanced eDiscovery and insider risk, sit at the top tier or in add-ons, so the real cost surfaces after an audit or a customer questionnaire rather than at purchase.
  • Annual term subscriptions commit you for the year and month-to-month terms cost measurably more per seat, so the flexibility to reduce seats during a quiet period is bought at a permanently higher rate.
  • Entra ID becomes the identity for everything else the organisation uses, which is the hardest kind of lock-in to put a number on, because leaving means re-federating every connected application rather than simply replacing a word processor.
  • The licensing model is complicated enough that most organisations are either over-licensed or quietly non-compliant, and reconciling it usually requires a partner or a specialist, which is a recurring cost that never appears in the advertised per-user figure.

RowShare

  • It is a table rather than a spreadsheet, so the formula and analysis capability people expect from Excel is not there, and anything requiring modelling or charting has to be exported and finished elsewhere.
  • It is a small independent product, so putting a recurring business process on it means a single vendor decision can end that process, and unlike the larger alternatives there is no ecosystem or partner network to fall back on.
  • Integration is largely through Zapier rather than deep native connectors, which adds an intermediary service, another subscription and another place for a data flow to fail silently.
  • The niche it occupies is increasingly covered by list tools included in Microsoft 365, so the purchase has to be justified against something the organisation may already be paying for and already administers.
  • Licensing in this category is per user, so if contributors need accounts rather than form links, an occasional contributor costs the same per head as a daily one, and it is worth confirming which model applies before planning a rollout.

Pricing, plan by plan

Microsoft 365

$7/month
  • Microsoft 365 Business Basic$7/month
    • Email and calendar with 50 GB mailbox
    • Web and mobile versions of Office apps
    • Microsoft Teams included
  • Microsoft 365 Business Standard$14/month
    • Desktop versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook
    • Email and Teams
    • 1 TB cloud storage per user
  • Microsoft 365 E5$60/month
    • Comprehensive security and compliance
    • All productivity apps
    • Advanced analytics

RowShare

On request

No published plan breakdown. See the RowShare review.

Which should you pick?

Choose Microsoft 365 if

  • You need office applications.
  • You also want hosted services.
Microsoft 365 review

Choose RowShare if

  • You need row-level permissions.
  • You also want column-level permissions.
RowShare review

Questions people ask

Is Microsoft 365 or RowShare better?
Neither clearly leads. Microsoft 365 starts at $7/month and RowShare at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Microsoft 365 or RowShare?
Microsoft 365 starts at $7/month and RowShare at On request.
Does Microsoft 365 or RowShare run on more platforms?
Both run on Web, so platform support will not decide this one for you.
What is Microsoft 365 best used for?
Microsoft 365 is most often used for any organisation that wants mail, documents, meetings and identity from one supplier on one bill., a company standardising on single sign-on, where entra id becomes the account other services authenticate against., regulated work that needs retention, legal hold and ediscovery across mail and documents, provided the tier that includes them is actually bought., a household that needs installed office applications on several machines rather than browser-only editing.. Of those, any organisation that wants mail, documents, meetings and identity from one supplier on one bill. and a company standardising on single sign-on, where entra id becomes the account other services authenticate against. are not what RowShare is typically brought in for.
What can Microsoft 365 do that RowShare cannot?
Microsoft 365 covers Office applications, Hosted services, Teams, Microsoft Entra ID. RowShare covers Row-level permissions, Column-level permissions, Typed columns, Forms.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Microsoft 365: What is the difference between Microsoft 365 and Office?

Office was a one-off licence for a specific version. Microsoft 365 is a subscription covering the applications and the hosted services together, and when payment stops the applications drop to a reduced state rather than continuing as they were.

RowShare: How is this different from a shared spreadsheet?

Sharing is per row rather than per file. Everyone works in one table, and each person sees only their own rows, which removes the consolidation step rather than speeding it up.

Microsoft 365: Is Teams included?

Not automatically for newer customers. Microsoft unbundled Teams and now sells it alongside the suite, so check what a given quotation actually covers.

RowShare: Can I get my data out?

Tables export to Excel and CSV, so the data itself moves. The permission structure, forms and reminders that made the process work do not, so an exit means rebuilding the workflow.

Microsoft 365: What happens to our files if we stop paying?

The documents remain yours and can be downloaded, but access to hosted mailboxes and sites ends after a retention window, so leaving requires a planned export rather than a cancellation.

RowShare: Is it a database?

No. It is a permissioned table with typed columns, not a relational store you can query, so it collects structured data rather than modelling it.

Microsoft 365: Is Copilot part of the subscription?

No. It is a per-user add-on on top of the base licence, generally with its own term commitment, and it is priced per seat regardless of how much any individual uses it.

RowShare: Who is behind it?

A French vendor with named enterprise customers. It is a small company, so weigh continuity carefully before making it the home of a process you expect to run for years.

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Related pages

More on Microsoft 365

More on RowShare

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