Microsoft has been busy releasing a ton of new products over the past couple of years, and one of the biggest revolutions in the Microsoft ecosystem has been the push towards the cloud. Microsoft has also been busy rebranding its products to better match its new realities. While all of these developments are great for organizations and users alike, we’ve noticed that it has been hard for some end-users to keep up!
A question that we are sometimes asked is the difference between Dynamics 365 and Office 365. Let me try and clarify this point for you today.
Microsoft Dynamics 365
The Microsoft Dynamics 365 label groups together cloud-based business applications. Historically, Microsoft had 4 distinct ERP products: GP, NAV, AX and SL. With the movement to the cloud, AX has evolved into Finance and Operations, and NAV into Business Central. To learn more about these differences, check out our recent blog post about Business Central and Finance and Operations.
With the continuation of the vision of bringing together all business applications, Microsoft now offers a complete CRM platform encompassing all activities related to the business, including sales and customer service, and other modules such as marketing and human resources, to name only a few. This product was also brought into the cloud and the Dynamics 365 portfolio. For more information, visit our Microsoft Dynamics 365 (CRM) page.
Microsoft 365 (previously Office 365)
This is the set of business tools that individuals use on a regular basis, such as Word, Excel, Outlook and countless others that continue to be added to this platform. Different bundles are available depending on your business needs. One of our new favorite tools within this bundle is Teams, which brings together all the different tools to promote collaboration and communication within your organization. Visit the Microsoft website for more information on the Microsoft 365 suite of tools.
These name changes have been made to better reflect the “One Microsoft” vision, which includes Dynamics 365, Microsoft 365 and Azure for storage. This vision includes the continuous convergence between personal productivity and business productivity. Another group of tools that help bridge this gap is the Microsoft Power Platform: Power Automate allows actions to flow between these different tools, Power BI lets you analyze your data efficiently, and Power Apps helps you extend your business applications when necessary to keep all your information in one place.
I hope this clarifies the differences between Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365. Still have questions? Contact us! We’ll be happy to go into more specific details with you. And my last tip: anything with a “365” in its product name means that it’s a cloud product.
