[ In short ]
- Microsoft 365 is the better pick if your team needs desktop Word, Excel and PowerPoint, Teams and SharePoint: email is one part of a large suite.
- Skein is business email on your own domain with an agent that follows up on every conversation. Hosted in the EU. By default nothing is sent without your OK.
- Microsoft 365 Business Basic is US$7, Standard US$14 and Premium US$22 per user per month, paid yearly, since 1 July 2026 (US prices); Copilot comes as an add-on or a bundle.
- Skein is pre-launch: founders can reserve a spot now and try the demo today.
01Is Skein a Microsoft 365 alternative?
For email, yes; for Office, no. Skein hosts the mail for your domain and replaces Exchange Online for that domain. It does not replace Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Teams, OneDrive or SharePoint. If those tools are why you pay Microsoft, stay with Microsoft 365. If you mainly pay for Outlook and want an agent that keeps your threads moving, Skein is built for that.
Microsoft 365 for business bundles Exchange email, Outlook, Teams, OneDrive and the Office apps, with security and device management on the higher plans. Copilot, Microsoft’s AI assistant, comes as Copilot Chat in the suites and as a paid Copilot Business add-on for the full assistant inside the apps.
Skein is business email on your own domain with an agent that follows up on every conversation. Hosted in the EU. The agent notices when a customer, investor or candidate is waiting and drafts the follow-up in your tone. By default nothing is sent without your OK, from the app or, at launch, from Slack or WhatsApp, and every send has a few seconds to undo. For the contacts you choose, you can let it send on its own.
02Microsoft 365 vs Skein, side by side
| Skein | Microsoft 365 | |
|---|---|---|
| Available | Pre-launch: founders reserve a spot now, teams get access in waves | Available today |
| Price basis | Per person with the agent, plus mailbox-only seats for the rest of the team | Per user per month, paid yearly: Business Basic US$7, Standard US$14, Premium US$22 (US list prices from 1 July 2026; €6.07, €12.13 and €19.06 in Spain before VAT). With Copilot included: Standard US$23.50, Premium US$32. Copilot Business add-on US$21 |
| Hosting region | EU: mail and agent run in Frankfurt | Customers who sign up in the EU or EFTA are in scope of Microsoft’s EU Data Boundary, with some documented exceptions |
| Email on your own domain | Yes, with unlimited aliases and shared inboxes | Yes |
| AI follow-up agent | Yes: spots quiet threads and drafts the follow-up in your tone | Copilot drafts and summarises email when you ask; no agent that chases quiet threads by itself |
| Approval before sending | Every send by default, with a few seconds to undo; auto-send only for contacts you choose | You send every email yourself |
| Approvals in Slack or WhatsApp | Both, at launch | No; Teams is Microsoft’s own chat |
| Calendar and meetings | Proposes times and sends the invite from your Google, Microsoft or iCloud calendar | Outlook calendar and Teams meetings built in |
| Migration in | Gmail history import; DNS records written for you on supported providers | Migration tools for IMAP, Google Workspace and Exchange |
| Apps | Its own web and phone apps, or Apple Mail, Outlook and the Gmail app | Outlook on Windows, Mac, web, iOS and Android; desktop Office apps on Standard and Premium |
| Standards and leaving | IMAP and autoconfig; export every mailbox over IMAP at any time | IMAP, POP and Exchange ActiveSync; admins can turn each off |
Microsoft raised Business Basic from US$6 to US$7 and Business Standard from US$12.50 to US$14 per user per month on 1 July 2026, for new and renewing customers. Business Premium stayed at US$22. Paying month to month costs more: Business Basic is US$8.40 on a monthly subscription. Until 31 December 2026, existing customers can add Copilot Business for US$18 in the first year.
03Where Microsoft 365 is the better choice
- Office. Business Standard and Premium include the desktop Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook apps. For teams that live in spreadsheets, or whose customers send .docx contracts with tracked changes, nothing else fits as well.
- Teams and SharePoint. Chat, calls, meetings and an intranet in one tenant, under one admin. Many larger customers and partners expect Teams invites.
- Security and device management. Business Premium adds Intune and Defender features that small IT teams rely on to manage laptops and phones.
- Availability and scale. Microsoft 365 is live today and has run email for very large organisations for years. Skein is not open yet.
If your company runs on Office files and Teams, Microsoft 365 is the better tool. Moving only email away from it saves little and splits your admin in two.
04Where Skein is different
A follow-up agent instead of an assistant you prompt
Copilot is an assistant: you open it and ask it to draft, rewrite or summarise. Skein watches the threads for you. When a buyer asked a question three days ago and nobody answered, or an investor asked for the data room before a partner meeting, it notices, writes the reply with the right link in your tone, and tells you why: what it read and who is waiting.
By default nothing is sent without your OK, from the app or, at launch, from Slack or WhatsApp, and every send has a few seconds to undo. For the contacts you choose, you can let it send on its own.
If you want to write better follow-ups yourself first, start with how to write a follow-up email and our sales follow-up cadence.
EU hosting without reading the fine print
Microsoft’s EU Data Boundary is a real commitment: for Microsoft 365 customers who sign up in the EU or EFTA, customer data is stored and processed in the EU, and Microsoft documents the limited cases where data still leaves it. Skein is simpler: mail and agent run in Frankfurt for every customer, the GDPR data processing agreement is part of the terms, and your mail is never used to train AI models. More in our guide to GDPR and EU email hosting.
One price per person with the agent
With Microsoft 365, the email and the AI assistant are two licences per person. Skein prices each person who has the agent, and gives teammates who only need an address a mailbox-only seat. Aliases are unlimited and shared inboxes like sales@ do not count as a mailbox. See the pricing section for the plan.
Per month, in euros, before VAT where the vendor lists it so
- Skein · founder price€362 with the agent + 3 mailboxes · list €53
- Google Workspace Business Starter + Fyxer Starter€94.065 × €8.10 + 2 × €26.78
- Google Workspace Business Standard + Fyxer Starter€134.565 × €16.20 + 2 × €26.78
- Microsoft 365 Business Basic + Fyxer Starter€89.965 × €7.28 + 2 × €26.78
- Microsoft 365 Business Standard + Fyxer Starter€126.365 × €14.56 + 2 × €26.78
Against the cheapest mix here, Skein costs €53.96 less a month, about €647.52 a year.
The suites also include documents, storage and video calls, which Skein does not. Skein’s price is the founder price for the first 100 teams, kept while you stay subscribed (see pricing).
Prices checked 5 Oct 2026 · sources
Public list prices per person per month. Yearly means a one-year plan or commitment. US-dollar prices are converted at the ECB reference rate of that day (1.1204 USD per euro). Discounts, promotions and taxes are left out.
- Google Workspace Business Starter · €8.10 monthly / €6.80 yearly
- Google Workspace Business Standard · €16.20 monthly / €13.60 yearly
- Microsoft 365 Business Basic · €7.28 monthly / €6.07 yearly
- Microsoft 365 Business Standard · €14.56 monthly / €12.13 yearly
- Fyxer Starter · US$30 monthly / US$22.50 yearly
- Fyxer Professional · US$50 monthly / US$37.50 yearly
- Superhuman Business · US$40 monthly / US$33 yearly
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05Who should pick which
- Pick Microsoft 365 if you need desktop Office, Teams or SharePoint, your IT manages devices through Intune, or your customers and partners expect you inside the Microsoft world.
- Pick Skein if you are a small B2B team where deals, fundraising and hiring happen in email threads, you want EU hosting by default, and you want the follow-ups drafted for you, sent with your approval by default.
- Still comparing? See Outlook alternatives and European email providers.
06How to switch from Microsoft 365 to Skein
Switching email means pointing your domain’s MX records at the new provider and moving the history. On supported DNS providers, Skein writes the records for you; anywhere else, you paste four lines. The importer announced for launch brings in Gmail history. If your history lives in Exchange, raise it on the setup call a founder does with every new team.
D − 2
Lower the TTL of your MX records
5 min, then wait one old TTL
Set MX (and the records you will change) to 300 seconds. Resolvers keep the old value until the old TTL runs out, often 1 to 24 hours.
D − 2
Verify the domain and add DKIM, SPF, DMARC
15 min, checks in minutes to hours
Add the new provider’s ownership TXT, its DKIM records and its include in your one SPF record. Outgoing mail can work before incoming moves.
D − 1
Create every mailbox and alias
10–60 min
Include shared addresses (hello@, invoices@) and forwarding rules. A catch-all for the first days catches the ones you forgot.
D − 1
Copy existing mail over IMAP
Hours to days per mailbox
Newest first. Gmail allows about 2.5 GB of IMAP download per user per day, so a 10 GB mailbox needs about four days. Start early.
D
Switch MX to the new provider
5 min, propagation up to 300 s
Replace the old MX records; do not leave them at a higher number. Send a test from an outside account.
D + 1 and D + 3
Run a second sync
10–30 min each
Some senders cached the old MX and delivered there. A delta copy picks up what landed late. Keep the old accounts until it finds nothing.
D + 7
Raise the TTL and close the old accounts
5 min
Set the TTL back to 3,600 seconds or more. Cancel the old provider only after the last sync came back empty.
- Decide what stays in Microsoft 365, if anything: OneDrive files, Teams, Office licences.
- Create the mailboxes and shared addresses in Skein.
- Bring your mail history across before the cut-over.
- Change the MX records and update SPF, DKIM and DMARC, removing Microsoft’s entries once mail flows.
- Keep the old tenant for a short overlap, then reduce the licences.
If DNS records are new to you, read MX records explained and SPF, DKIM and DMARC explained before you start.
Skein is not open yet. It opens to its first teams soon, in waves, and founders can reserve a spot now on the founder price. Until then you can try the demo with sample mail, nothing to install.
Questions
- Can I keep using Outlook with Skein?
- Yes. Skein supports IMAP and autoconfig, so the Outlook app connects to it like any standard mail server. You can also use Skein's own web and phone apps.
- How much does Microsoft 365 cost for a small business?
- Since 1 July 2026, Business Basic is US$7, Business Standard US$14 and Business Premium US$22 per user per month, paid yearly (US list prices; in Spain €6.07, €12.13 and €19.06 before VAT). Copilot Business is an extra US$21 per user per month paid yearly, or US$18 in the first year for existing customers who add it by 31 December 2026; Standard and Premium are also sold with Copilot included, at US$23.50 and US$32.
- Is Microsoft 365 data stored in the EU?
- For customers who sign up in an EU or EFTA country, Microsoft 365 is in scope of the EU Data Boundary, so customer data is stored and processed in the EU. Microsoft documents some limited transfers outside it.
- Does Copilot follow up on emails automatically?
- Copilot drafts, rewrites and summarises email when you ask it to. It does not watch threads and prepare follow-ups for the ones that went quiet on its own.
See Skein follow up for you
Business email on your own domain with an agent that follows up on every conversation. Hosted in the EU. Try the demo with sample mail, nothing to install.
[ Sources ]
- 01Microsoft: Microsoft 365 pricing and packaging updates (July 2026)
- 02Microsoft 365 Copilot plans and pricing
- 03Microsoft 365 business plans and pricing (US)
- 04Microsoft 365 para empresas: planes y precios (Spain)
- 05Microsoft: what is the EU Data Boundary
Facts about other products were checked on 5 Oct 2026; prices and plans change.