Tag Archives: Microsoft Defender

Modern Work Plan Comparison documents

The Modern Work Plan Comparison documents for November 2025 have been released. These documents now fully reflect the updated names for the Defender and Purview Add-ons and show the reintroduced Office and Microsoft 365 licenses with Teams included. In the SMB comparison, a new footnote confirms a maximum of 300 User SLs across all Business plans combined. Separate PDF files are available for the Enterprise, SMB, US Government, and Education sectors which you can find here: https://bit.ly/4hn2hS2. If you’re a partner, an Excel version of these files is also available.

If you’d like a copy, drop us an email from your work email address to info@licensingschool.co.uk, and we’ll send it on.

Modern Work Plan Comparison documents

The Modern Work Plan Comparison documents are available for October 2025, with separate PDFs for the Enterprise, SMB, US Government, and Education sectors. Be cautious with the Education page, however! It shows that the new Microsoft Purview Suite and Microsoft Defender Suite can be added onto Office 365 A1, even though the Product Terms state you need A3 or higher as a qualifying plan. We’ve started documenting these kinds of errors in the “Licensing Guide cautionary notes” section of LicenseVerse, so do keep an eye on that page for these useful insights. In the meantime, you’ll find the documents here: https://bit.ly/4hn2hS2. If you’re a partner, we have an Excel version of these files.

Drop us an email on info@licensingschool.co.uk from your work email address and we’ll send it on.

Microsoft rebrand security and compliance suites for Enterprise plans

Microsoft rebrand the security and compliance suite Add-ons for Microsoft 365 Enterprise plans from 1 October, 2025. This aligns the names with the recently introduced SMB security and compliance suites which you can read more about on our blog here: https://bit.ly/3IsVjhH. The functionality remains the same, with Microsoft 365 E5 Security now becoming the Microsoft Defender Suite, and Microsoft 365 E5 Compliance becoming the Microsoft Purview Suite.

Find out the details here: https://bit.ly/46R1KTE.

Security and compliance Add-ons for Microsoft 365 Business Premium

Microsoft announce a range of security and compliance Add-ons for Microsoft 365 Business Premium. From a security perspective, there’s the Microsoft Defender Suite for Business Premium, costing $10 per user per month, and for compliance there’s the Microsoft Purview Suite for Business Premium, also costing $10 per user per month. Alternatively, the Microsoft Defender and Purview Suites for Business Premium are a cost effective way of purchasing everything at $15 per user per month.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3JUp635, with details of what components are in which suite.

Microsoft Defender licensing guidance document

There’s a new (January 2025) licensing guidance document for Microsoft Defender. It’s an introductory-level document but might be useful to start you on the road to understand the licensing of Microsoft Defender for client and server endpoints.

Find this new guide here: https://bit.ly/3EgYtCy.

Microsoft Sentinel

Microsoft announce that Microsoft Sentinel is now generally available in the Microsoft Defender portal as part of the unified security operations platform.

The announcement article here: https://bit.ly/3WvzCli gives a good overview of what Microsoft Sentinel customers on the commercial cloud with at least one Microsoft Defender XDR workload deployed will now be able to do. Microsoft Sentinel itself analyses large amounts of data to accelerate threat detection and responses across an organisation, and is billed by the volume of data stored in a Log Analytics workspace and analysed in Microsoft Sentinel.

Find the pricing page here: https://bit.ly/3Y9DrO7.

Microsoft Defender for Business servers preview

Microsoft announce that Defender for Business servers is now in preview, offering endpoint security for Windows and Linux servers for small and medium-sized businesses. It’s free during this preview period and will then be charged at $3 per server instance per month at General Availability, when it will be available as an Add-on licence to Microsoft 365 Business Premium or Microsoft Defender for Business.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3RZ7TVO, and a useful FAQ here: https://bit.ly/3BhF3d3.

Microsoft Defender for Individuals

Microsoft expand the Microsoft Defender family with Microsoft Defender for Individuals.

This is an online security application for Microsoft 365 Personal and Family subscribers, and is available across Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android. Licensed users simply sign in, and once their Microsoft 365 credentials are validated, they are granted access to Microsoft Defender.

Find the product announcement here: https://bit.ly/3yntqzw, and learn more about the Microsoft Defender product family here: https://bit.ly/3ymw7RM.

Microsoft Defender for Business

Microsoft introduce Microsoft Defender for Business – capabilities from the Microsoft Defender for Endpoint solution optimised for businesses with up to 300 employees.

It will be available through a preview soon, and thereafter sold via a CSP partner or Microsoft’s website. Licensing wise, it will be included in the Microsoft 365 Business Premium product, or available as a standalone offering costing $3 per user per month.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/31VYmZP.

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Plan 1

Microsoft announce that Microsoft Defender for Endpoint will be renamed Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Plan 2 with a subset of functionality being made available as a Plan 1. The new Plan 1 will be available later in 2021 as a standalone licence, and the capabilities will also be added to Microsoft 365 E3/A3 licences.

Find the full announcement with more details here: https://bit.ly/3DCezSs.