Claude, Copilot or ChatGPT for your SME

Most companies with 20 to 250 people end up choosing between these three. All of them are solid, and none of them is the right answer for every company. Below we put the business plans side by side, using only what the vendors publish on their own pages, and we say where we would lean.

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Short answer

If your company runs on Microsoft 365 and your IT wants one tenant and one admin centre, Microsoft 365 Copilot is the obvious place to start. If you work across Microsoft 365 and Google, or your work is long documents, writing and analysis, Claude Team is a strong choice. ChatGPT Business is the broadest general assistant, and many of your people already know it. Plenty of companies combine two of them.

Side by side

Prices checked in October 2026 on the vendors’ official pages. Microsoft prices come from the Belgian Microsoft page, in euro, excluding VAT, with an annual subscription. Anthropic and OpenAI publish prices in US dollars excluding tax and say that prices can vary by country and currency, so check what your own account shows.

	Claude (Anthropic)	Microsoft 365 Copilot	ChatGPT (OpenAI)
Plan for an SME	Team, for 2 to 150 people	Microsoft 365 Copilot Business, on Microsoft 365 Business plans of up to 300 users	Business, for teams of 2 to 200 people
List price per user per month	Standard: $20 billed annually, $25 billed monthly. Premium (more usage): $100 billed annually, $125 billed monthly	Copilot Business add-on: €18.20. With Business Standard: €20.36. With Business Premium: €27.73. Annual commitment	Standard: $20 billed annually, $25 billed monthly. Premium (more usage): $100 billed annually, $125 billed monthly
Good to know about price	Prices exclude tax. Extra usage can be bought on top	The add-on requires an existing Business Basic, Standard or Premium plan. Until 31 December 2026 existing customers pay €15.60 for the first year. Some agent features are billed per use with Copilot Credits	Minimum of two seats. Usage beyond the included limits can be paid with workspace credits
Larger companies	Enterprise: $20 per seat per month billed annually, plus usage at API rates, minimum of 20 seats	Microsoft 365 Copilot for enterprise plans (not compared here)	Enterprise: price on request
Training on your data	"None by default" for Team and Enterprise	Prompts and responses are not used to train the underlying models	No training on your business data by default
Data and GDPR	Data processing addendum with standard contractual clauses, part of the commercial terms. Your company is the controller, Anthropic the processor	Enterprise data protection: data stays within the Microsoft 365 service boundary, covered by the Microsoft data protection addendum	OpenAI signs a data processing addendum for Business. Admins set retention. Data residency in Europe is an Enterprise option
Sign-in and users	Single sign-on and just-in-time provisioning on Team. SCIM on Enterprise	Your existing Microsoft 365 accounts and Microsoft Entra ID	SAML single sign-on on Business. SCIM on Enterprise
Audit and compliance	Audit logs and the Compliance API on Enterprise	Prompts and responses are logged for Microsoft Purview and eDiscovery. Copilot follows your existing Microsoft 365 permissions	Compliance API and role-based access on Enterprise. SOC 2 Type 2 on Business
Microsoft 365	Microsoft 365 connector, Claude for Microsoft 365 and Claude for Outlook	Built into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams. With the add-on, Copilot in Teams needs a Teams licence	Microsoft 365 connector, plus extensions for Excel, Word and PowerPoint
Google Workspace	Connectors for Google Drive, Gmail and Google Calendar	Copilot connectors for external data sources. Copilot itself is built around Microsoft 365	Google Workspace connector and a Google Sheets extension
Own skills and agents	Skills you can roll out to the whole organisation, Projects, Claude Code and Cowork	Agents for internal use with Copilot Studio, included. Cowork and Autopilot run on Copilot Credits	Custom GPTs, Projects, Skills (beta), workspace agents and Codex

Prices checked in October 2026

The prices are close. What you already use and what your IT has to manage usually decide.

When to choose which

Microsoft 365 Copilot

You live in Outlook, Teams and Excel, your files are in SharePoint and OneDrive, and IT wants permissions, logging and licences in one place. Copilot Chat is already included with eligible Microsoft 365 plans, so you can try the basics before you buy the add-on.

Claude

You work across Microsoft 365 and Google, or your work is long and precise: quotes, contracts, reports, writing in your own voice, code. Skills that the whole organisation shares help when you want everyone to work the same way.

ChatGPT

You want one general assistant that most people already know, with connectors to both Microsoft 365 and Google and plenty of room for custom GPTs and agents. Check whether you need data residency or SCIM, because those sit in Enterprise.

Two of them

This is common. For example, Copilot Chat for everyone and Claude or ChatGPT seats for the teams that write, analyse or build the most. Keep one register of what runs where.

Where Grok Bot fits

Grok Bot is a different kind of tool. It is not a fourth chat assistant for every desk. Its bots work inside your apps with their own cloud computer, and they ask for approval on sensitive steps. It can sit next to any of the three above for work that runs across several apps. Grok Business is listed at $30 per user per month on x.ai. SCIM and audit logs for Grok Bot are Enterprise features. We use Grok Bot every day at NUVAI, which is also why we keep this comparison about the three assistants most SMEs compare.

Read more about how we roll out: Claude implementation for teams · Grok Bot implementation for teams

Connecting your CRM: what MCP is and why it matters

MCP stands for Model Context Protocol. It is an open standard for connecting an AI assistant to the systems your data lives in, such as your CRM or your documents. Anthropic introduced it in November 2024, and since December 2025 it has been part of the Agentic AI Foundation at the Linux Foundation. A system offers an MCP server once, and assistants that support MCP can use it.

In practice your team no longer copies data from the CRM into a chat window. HubSpot runs its own remote MCP server, generally available for all HubSpot accounts since April 2026, which reads and updates CRM records within the signed-in user's permissions. HubSpot also offers a connector for Claude on paid Claude plans. For Grok, the x.ai docs describe a HubSpot connection over MCP that is read-only. The table above shows how each tool connects to Microsoft 365 and Google.

The connection layer is yours. You decide which systems are connected and with which rights, and you write that down in your AI register. Because MCP is a standard, you can usually keep those connections when you change model or add a second one.

Read more about how we roll out: Claude implementation for teams · Grok Bot implementation for teams

Before you sign

Read your own contract and data processing addendum. Vendor pages change, and what counts is what is in your terms.
Check the price in euro in your own account or with your reseller, and count usage-based credits on top of the seat price.
Decide who owns each tool, and put it in your AI register. Since February 2025 the EU AI Act also asks for sufficient AI literacy among the people who use it.

Frequently asked questions

Which one is cheapest for a team?

On list price they are close. Claude Team Standard and ChatGPT Business Standard are both $20 per user per month billed annually. The Microsoft 365 Copilot Business add-on is €18.20 per user per month on an annual commitment, on top of a Microsoft 365 Business plan. Usage-based credits can add to all three.

Do they train on our company data?

According to the vendors, not by default on these business plans. Anthropic lists "None by default" for Team and Enterprise. OpenAI says it does not train on business data by default. Microsoft says prompts and responses are not used to train the underlying models. Always check your own contract.

Is Copilot Chat free?

Microsoft says Copilot Chat is included at no extra cost with eligible Microsoft 365 plans. Copilot inside Word, Excel, Outlook and Teams, with access to your work data, needs a Microsoft 365 Copilot licence.

Do we get SCIM on the team plans?

Not on Claude Team or ChatGPT Business: both vendors list SCIM under Enterprise. Claude Team does include single sign-on with just-in-time provisioning. With Copilot, users come from your Microsoft 365 tenant and Microsoft Entra ID.

Can we keep our data in Europe?

OpenAI lists data residency, including Europe, as an Enterprise feature. For Claude and Copilot we did not find a clear statement on the pages we checked, so ask the vendor or your reseller for your plan.

Can we use more than one?

Yes, and many companies do. Licences are per user, so you can give different teams different tools. Keep one overview of who uses what, with what data.

Does NUVAI sell these licences?

No. Licences stay in your name and are billed by the vendor or your reseller. We set up the tool you choose and train your team, for a fixed price in the Kickstart.

Can we connect HubSpot without copy-paste?

Yes, through MCP. HubSpot's remote MCP server is generally available for all HubSpot accounts since April 2026, and HubSpot offers a connector for Claude on paid Claude plans that can read and update records within the permissions an admin approves. For Grok, x.ai documents a read-only HubSpot connection. We set up these connections in the Kickstart.

Want help choosing and setting it up?

In the Kickstart we take three to five processes, pick the tool that fits them and set it up on your own accounts in two weeks, for €4,500 excl. VAT. The first workflow goes live within 72 hours of your users being provisioned.

See how the Kickstart works

Sources (checked in October 2026)

Claude and Anthropic are trademarks of Anthropic, PBC. Microsoft 365 and Copilot are trademarks of Microsoft. ChatGPT is a trademark of OpenAI. Grok is a trademark of SpaceXAI LLC. NUVAI is independent of these vendors.