HCL Verse vs Office 365 comparison

The compared HCLSoftware and Microsoft solutions aren't in the same category. HCLSoftware is ranked #13 in EA , and holds a 1.4% mindshare in the category. Microsoft is ranked #2 in CCP , with an average rating of 8.5, and holds a 6.9% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of HCLSoftware users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

HCL Verse

Read 3 HCL Verse reviews

397 Views
294 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Office 365

Read 143 Office 365 reviews

1,440 Views
340 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

HCL Verse

Office 365

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between HCL Verse and Office 365 based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

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Buyer's Guide

Email Applications

June 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

HCL Verse

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Email Applications (13th)

Office 365

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

143

Ranking in other categories

Content Collaboration Platforms (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

While both are Messaging and Collaboration solutions, they serve different purposes. HCL Verse is designed for Email Applications and holds a mindshare of 1.4%, up 1.4% compared to last year.
Office 365, on the other hand, focuses on Content Collaboration Platforms, holds 6.9% mindshare, up 5.9% since last year.

Email Applications

Content Collaboration Platforms

Featured Reviews

Marcos Roberto Silva

Diretor at MASTERDOM

Stable, scalable, and good interface

HCL Verse has a nice interface and it is a practical email solution. There are a diverse set of features, such as the search bar on top of the screens. The usability from the old applications to the new version has been very good. It was great that we were able to migrate applications from the older version to the new one.

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Gary Cook

Executive at Empowered Analytics

Access to advanced features boosts productivity despite pricing concerns in developing regions

I need to do maintenance for Office 365 very seldom, once a year. In the maintenance process for Office 365, we have about 12 people involved. For the maintenance side of Office 365, only one person is involved. Looking at Office 365's pricing, I would give it a 4 on a scale from 1 to 10. My overall rating for Office 365 is an 8 out of 10, but for the product itself, I would give it a 10. I would definitely recommend Office 365 to other businesses, probably a 9 out of 10 for recommendation. This is only because of its price and the fact that they do not take into account developing countries such as South Africa, where they should give us more favorable prices or local prices. We do not have a partnership with Microsoft, which is a sore point for us. We have reached out to Microsoft South Africa, and they are very hard to contact and largely uncooperative. We are a B-Level 2 and a B-Level 1, which are local affirmative action ratings that companies get. Level 1 is the highest, and Level 8 is the lowest. We hold amongst the highest BEE ratings, but we have not found Microsoft South Africa to be forthcoming or very open. We should have a partnership with them, and we run Power BI as we are a Power BI shop now. I strongly would want to see a box within Office 365 for our team to have ChatGPT through OpenAI as well. We use Excel as a data source for many tasks and find that it integrates really well with Python. We write a lot of Python code and use Excel as a data sheet many times, and we operate through SQL and other zero elements as well. From an Office 365 viewpoint, we find that with Copilot and Python and Excel's provision for Python, it is very useful.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"HCL Verse has a nice interface and it is a practical email solution. There are a diverse set of features, such as the search bar on top of the screens."

"The most valuable feature is the mail server."

"Most of the work that seems not to work offline works perfectly with Microsoft Office 2013, like converting a Word document to a PDF file."

"If you have a global solution, you can go from one product to the other very easily. And then you can share data between all the different tools of Office which is good because participation and sharing is very good. That's the most important aspect of Office 365."

"The product helps us be more efficient. It helps us to have a standardized way of doing things."

"It is stable."

"Many of the features in Office 365 are good, but I think Excel is a very good tool."

"Quarantine email alerts to users to allow the email to their inbox (tricky but handy) - tricky if one doesn't have third-party email security, handy if one has got good third party email security)."

"Cloud-based management is valuable and software deployment is positive."

"There are all sorts of really good tools for use on the information security side that allow us to make sure that our people are doing business and doing business right."

More Office 365 pros

Cons

"The solution could improve by allowing us to use a color that we want in the editing boxes."

"Security is very important to us, so improvements to this functionality are welcome."

"Could include integration with other single sign-on solutions."

"A need that a company like ours has is that we want to be able to have data flow into one tool, for example, for all the management of tasks through the company and workflow of who is doing what and so on. There are no real solutions for this at the moment in Office 365. It would be nice if they could implement this in the next release, so we can have one solution from one company giving us the whole data and flow of data into the company."

"Office 365 could allow for smoother collaboration with other companies, which is the main reason we use it. The B2B connection is something we need, like global adverse lists between two tenants or multiple users. That's what we're missing at the moment."

"Security is still complex, but the admin console improving."

"Sometimes the configurations of the error troubleshooting are pretty problematic and there are a lot of issues that happen even if you follow the step-by-step guides. They can work on fixing this issue. If there are a lot of issues in your Windows or your Office or anything, you restart your PC and it works. They need to get rid of this need."

"They should do more testing before product releases."

"Sometimes the synchronization between the desktop and online is a little bit slow."

"I would like to see the macro functionality in Excel made simpler."

More Office 365 cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is reasonable."

"This is an affordable solution but the price could be improved."

"The pricing is high and has actually caused us to limit the number of licenses we purchase due to budgeting."

"The price of Office 365 is very expensive."

"I think that we pay $9.99 USD per user, monthly."

"We have a license to use this solution. We have an E3 license which covers many different solutions."

"The pricing is not really high, but one can get the software with the license key for free."

"Good reporting and good value subscriptions for international calls."

"Licensing, billing, and accounting are available from the management interface."

"I would rate the solution 3 out of 5 for the price. I think Microsoft presents a good solution concerning the price."

More Office 365 pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Government

21%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

51%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Office 365?

For pricing, I think it's fairly priced, I would rate it 8.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Office 365?

The areas of Office 365 that have room for improvement are what should be better in this solution.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Office 365?

A typical use case for Office 365 is how I primarily use this solution.

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Comparisons

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Compared 51% of the time

Huddle vs HCL Verse

Compared 10% of the time

Microsoft Exchange Online vs HCL Verse

Compared 9% of the time

Hub vs HCL Verse

Compared 9% of the time

Adobe Experience Manager vs HCL Verse

Compared 6% of the time

More HCL Verse Competitors

Google Workspace vs Office 365

Compared 39% of the time

Amazon WorkDocs vs Office 365

Compared 9% of the time

Atlassian Confluence vs Office 365

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft OneDrive vs Office 365

Compared 7% of the time

More Office 365 Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Email Applications

June 2025

Download HCL Verse product report

Buyer's Guide

Office 365

June 2025

Download Office 365 product report

Also Known As

Verse, IBM Verse

Microsoft Office 365, Office 365 Enterprise, Office 365 Enterprise E1, Office 365 Enterprise E3, Office 365 Enterprise E5, Office 365 ProPlus, Office 365 Business, Office 365 Business Essentials, Office 365 Business Premium, Office 365 F1

Overview

IBM Verse is a powerful email hosting solution that enables users to access their business communications from a laptop or desktop browser or from a mobile device. This email and business messaging experience is based on an innovative user-centric design, including social analytics and advanced search capabilities. IBM Verse helps users quickly find and focus on what content is most important, empowering them to build stronger working relationships while optimizing business results.

HCLSoftware

Office 365 is more than just Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. It provides powerful services like business-class email, online storage, and teamwork solutions that you can access from anywhere. Bring teams and resources together with solutions like Microsoft Teams and Skype for Business that make working together more productive and enjoyable regardless of where participants are located. Easily implement security and privacy controls to help protect business data and devices against malicious threats and help you meet your compliance obligations. Automatic updates ensure your employees will always have the latest features and security updates.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Canon Marketing Japan Inc., Australian Trade Commission, BTC, Havas, Canal Barge Co.Inc., RAVInvest, Elemental Path, WDR mediagroup

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