European alternatives to Microsoft 365
Microsoft's productivity suite of Office apps, Outlook, Teams and OneDrive, the default in most workplaces. A US-governed cloud under the CLOUD Act, with sovereignty offered contractually rather than by jurisdiction.
Company information about Microsoft 365
- Company
- Microsoft Corporation
- Headquarters
- Redmond, United States
- Founded
- 2011
- Data jurisdiction
- United States
- Ownership
- Publicly traded
- GDPR
- No
- Open source
- No
- Infrastructure
- Own infrastructure
Why people switch away from Microsoft 365
Bundling ruled anti-competitive
The EU opened a formal antitrust probe in 2023 into Microsoft bundling Teams with Office; in 2025 Microsoft agreed to unbundle it worldwide to avoid a fine that could have reached $24.5 billion.
Tied to military surveillance use
Reporting in 2025 found Israel's military used Microsoft Azure, the cloud underpinning 365, to store mass-surveillance data on Palestinians; Microsoft later cut the unit's access.
Answers to US law
Microsoft is a US company, so 365 data sits under the CLOUD Act, with European data sovereignty offered contractually rather than by jurisdiction.
Everyday annoyances
- Subscription creep. Microsoft has repeatedly raised 365 prices, most recently bundling in Copilot AI features that many subscribers never asked for or use.
- Deep ecosystem lock-in. Word, Excel and Outlook nudge you constantly to save to OneDrive and sign into a Microsoft account, making a clean switch away a real untangling job.
- Recurring outages. Multiple global outages have taken down Teams, Outlook and SharePoint simultaneously in recent years, including major incidents in 2024.
- Confusing plan tiers. Business, Family, Personal and enterprise E1/E3/E5 tiers overlap awkwardly, making it hard to tell what a given price actually includes.
- AI features are on by default. Copilot is switched on across the suite from the start, and turning it off means digging through admin settings most users never see.
Looking for a curated recommendation? Read our full guide → Best Microsoft 365 alternatives
European alternatives to Microsoft 365
End-to-end encrypted collaboration suite. Docs, spreadsheets, and kanban boards. The server never sees your content.
Open-source collaboration suite developed by French company Linagora. Combines Matrix-based messaging, cloud drive, mail, and calendar in one platform. EU-hosted and self-hostable.
German office suite from Nuremberg with word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation apps that read and write Microsoft formats natively. A free version, FreeOffice, is also available. Runs offline, so your documents stay on your device.
A complete, free office suite – documents, spreadsheets, presentations – that runs entirely on your own computer. No subscription, no cloud, no tracking.
LibreOffice in the browser, built by Collabora. Integrates with Nextcloud for a fully European document editing suite.
Self-hostable productivity suite. Docs, calendar, contacts and more, all fully European.
Open-source office suite for documents, spreadsheets, and presentations with some of the best Microsoft Office file compatibility around. Registered in Riga, Latvia. Self-host it for free or use the hosted cloud edition.
Want more options? Browse all European Office suite alternatives →
People also replace
Google Docs 
Notion 
Microsoft Word 
Microsoft Excel 
Microsoft PowerPoint 
Google Slides Start somewhere.
Switching everything overnight is not realistic. Start where it matters most: your email, your cloud storage, your business tools. Replace one thing at a time.
The European Alternative already exists.
Pick Europe.
Why avoid United States-owned services?
CLOUD Act
Forces US companies to hand over data stored anywhere in the world upon government request, including data on European servers.
FISA Section 702
Authorises mass surveillance of non-US persons using data held by US tech platforms, without a warrant or notification.
GDPR vs US law conflict
EU courts have repeatedly found that US surveillance law conflicts with European fundamental rights. Schrems I and II both invalidated EU-US data transfer agreements.