Our verdict
For a business with Microsoft 365 Business Premium, start by checking whether its included Defender for Business protection is deployed and monitored before buying another endpoint product.
Microsoft Defender for Business: buying brief
Best for: SMBs, especially existing Microsoft 365 Business Premium customers
Consider an alternative if: You need support for more than 300 users or a fully managed response service
Selected plan: Microsoft Defender for Business · $3.00/user/month
Annual subscription before taxes. Included in Microsoft 365 Business Premium; confirm existing entitlement before buying. Server licensing is separate.
| Staff | Monthly equivalent | 12-month equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | $30.00 | $360.00 |
| 25 | $75.00 | $900.00 |
| 50 | $150.00 | $1800.00 |
Research-based profile; no hands-on testing claimed. Documentation checked 2026-09-22.
What exactly is included?
Microsoft lists Defender for Business as a standalone product and as part of Microsoft 365 Business Premium. The product supports up to 300 users and up to five devices per user. Server licensing is separate. Confirm supported operating systems, device eligibility and the selected subscription before rollout.
The buying brief above shows standalone license costs. Those are not incremental costs for users already covered by an eligible Business Premium subscription. Your existing bill, actual assigned licenses and deployment status matter more than a generic comparison chart.
Buying protection and enabling protection are different
Check whether every business device is enrolled, reporting and assigned the intended policy. Name the person responsible for alerts and document how they escalate a suspected incident. An included license has little operational value if nobody checks its deployment or responds to findings.
Start with a representative pilot device. Confirm that required business applications still work, review exclusions and establish how updates are managed. Expand in batches and record exceptions rather than treating the purchase as proof of complete protection.
When should you evaluate another product?
Compare alternatives if your supported-device requirements, administration workflow or support needs differ from what this product provides. A team needing a managed response service should verify that requirement explicitly; endpoint software and a staffed response service are different purchases.
See the endpoint protection buying guide for alternatives. Include implementation effort, ongoing administration and response ownership in the comparison, as well as license costs.
A thirty-day verification plan
- Week one: confirm subscription entitlements and inventory business devices.
- Week two: pilot onboarding, review application compatibility and document alert handling.
- Week three: extend coverage and identify devices that are missing or inactive.
- Week four: review policy exceptions and exercise the incident escalation process.
Use supported vendor test procedures; do not introduce live malware into a production environment. Keep backup recovery checks separate from endpoint checks, because detecting an incident and restoring business operations require different evidence.
This profile is based on Microsoft’s published product information, not an independent performance test. It does not claim that a subscription alone establishes compliance.
Next steps
Use the free business security assessment to identify gaps before choosing tools. Review our research methodology and affiliate disclosure. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases through affiliate links.