It was only in 2019 that Google said that it had 5 million paying G Suite customer in 2018, while it had 70 million G Suite for Education users.
G Suite, which includes Gmail, Google Docs, Hangouts, Meet and other apps, goes beyond their free counterparts, to add more advanced settings, features and capabilities. At the time, its number was shy in comparison to Microsoft Office 365, which had 200 million monthly active users of its version for businesses.
On March 12, in an interview with Axios, G Suite head Javier Soltero suggested that G Suite has quietly passed a major milestone, revealing that it has reached 2 billion active users.
With this milestone, G Suite is slowly catching up with Microsoft Office 365, which has long been Google's main competitor in its enterprise offerings.
However, Soltero declined to offer the details of how many of those 2 billion users are users for products beyond Gmail or how many are actually paying users.
Soltero who previously worked at Microsoft and founded mail app Accompli, joined Google in 2019.
He said that his focus has been on doubling down on features that make G Suite unique, like its robust search, conversation focus in Gmail and built-in collaboration.
What distinguishes Google from Microsoft, Soltero said that:
Google G Suite and Office 365 have similar offerings, as they both are cloud-based products aimed for businesses. The key differences are in their pricing plans, storage space, and the number of intrinsic features.
G Suite apps are regarded to be more user-friendly and easier to learn. For those who work primarily from the web right from the start for example, G Suite may come as an advantage. G Suite is also said to be more simple, with a better focus on speed.
As for Office 365, the product has the advantage of users who have already been familiar with Word, Excel and other Office apps. However, it's said that Office is notorious for being loaded with complex, unused features which can cause confusion.
This is why from the start, Google made its G Suite apps to be compatible with Microsoft Office.
To compete with the rivaling platform, Google G Suite supports Microsoft Office formatting conventions and file types.
And with this milestone, Google is becoming a more formidable challenger to Microsoft when it comes to office productivity tools.
Closing his interview with Axios, Soltero told Google still has "work to do".
