Box cloud storage combines strong security with popular third-party integrations, which makes it great for productivity and collaboration. Box gets a lot of things right, helping it compete with the best cloud storage services. However, it isn’t a perfect solution, especially if you’re budget conscious or looking for private encryption. Keep reading this Box review for all the details.
When it comes to the best cloud storage for business, Box is among the options. Offering integrations with platforms such as Office 365 or Google Workspace, it has customization and admin controls, offering plenty of flexibility.
What Features Does Box Offer?
Box isn’t short on cloud features, and depending on your business needs (team or individual), you might be able to get by without the paid add-ons. However, the best features centered around privacy and security are either on the more expensive plans or come as separate purchases.
Box Notes
Box’s native apps, fortunately, come with every account. One such app is the note-taking app. Similar to Dropbox Paper, Box Notes lets you create, edit and share documents in a web browser. Default templates include support for agendas, calendars, project plans and newsletters.
Box Sign
Box Sign accomplishes what other apps like DocuSign or Adobe Sign do: it enables you to send or receive requests for digital document signatures. Ironically, both DocuSign and Adobe Sign are embedded apps upon account creation.
It’s worth noting that, although the website indicates that every plan has access to Box Sign, the Business Starter plan doesn’t have access to it. However, the free individual plan did.
Any files you send for a requested signature or any signature requests you get all appear in the “sign” tab. It’s a simple but effective digital signing app.
Box Drive
Once you download the desktop app, you’ll automatically gain access to Box Drive. It functions like an external hard disk, complete with the option to sync (or not sync) folders or take folders and files offline. The desktop app is also how you enable Box sync, or selective sync (covered below).
Box Drive does a good job of freeing up disk space. Additionally, you can work on files within the drive app, and if synced with your cloud account, it will update the changes and versions you make.
File Versioning and Bandwidth
Versioning and bandwidth limits vary depending on which plan you subscribe to. On the free Individual plan, versioning isn’t available. With Box’s paid plans, there’s a max limit to the number of file versions available. However, if you want fewer versions held, you can lower the number in the admin console under enterprise settings.
For example, if you have the Business Plus plan, the maximum number of file versions is 50. If you only want to keep 30 versions, you can make that change. Additionally, there’s no time limit on how long Box holds file versions. Once you exceed the allotted number, Box deletes the oldest version.
The most premium plan — Enterprise Plus — has unlimited file versioning, which effectively means you can preserve the entire history of a file forever. Check out the best cloud storage for versioning if you need more customization.
Bandwidth limitations tie directly to your purchased plan, and unlike file versioning, bandwidth limitations are not adjustable. Both uploads and downloads contribute to an account’s bandwidth limits.
A free account gets 10GB of downloads from shared links each month, while the paid plans get 2TB. All accounts, regardless of plan, get 1TB of bandwidth for files uploaded or downloaded.
How Much Does Box Cost?
Box offers plans for individuals and teams, as well as plans catered toward businesses. With the business plans, you get the most features from a Box subscription but at the highest prices — though you do get unlimited users and unlimited storage, which means this could be a good option for large businesses.
A free Box account, called the Individual plan, comes with 10GB of storage. The Personal Pro plan upgrades the storage to 100GB and costs $10 monthly when paying annually. Otherwise, it’s $14 per month.
The first business plan is called the Business Starter, which offers 100GB for at least three users and up to 10 users. It costs $5 per month per user when paid annually, or $7 per month per user.
Box Business Plan Pricing
Box’s dedicated business plans have the features and functionality that companies most likely need. All of Box’s business plans — minus the Business Starter plan — don’t limit the amount of storage or number of users. As a rule, the higher the plan price, the more features you get.
The Business plan costs $15 per user per month when paid annually or $20 monthly. Business Plus increases to $25 per month per user on an annual plan or $33 per month. Box’s Enterprise plan runs $35 per user per month, paid annually, or $47 per month. The Enterprise Plus plan requires contacting a sales representative for pricing, as it is customizable.
None of the above prices include paid add-ons, such as Box KeySafe or Box Shield. Adding these options increases the prices. However, you’ll need to have a conversation with Box to get the additional costs.
For comparison, both Dropbox and Tresorit have similar plans. Dropbox’s business Standard plan costs $15 per month per user annually and comes with 5TB. Tresorit’s Business Plus plan costs $27.49 per month per user for 2TB of storage.
Box does offer a 14-day free trial, so you can also test out a plan with more features than the free version.