Office 365 MDM vs Microsoft Intune

Office 365 MDM vs Microsoft Intune

Mobile Device Management (MDM) is a useful option for a large number of organizations that want to manage their mobile devices securely (Android, iOS, and Windows).

Fortunately, many subscriptions to Office 365 include MDM. You can use Microsoft Intune to manage your mobile devices in addition to MDM for Office 365.

As opposed to MDM, Intune is not an Office 365 integrated feature. You can purchase it as a paid subscription using Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS).

The MDM includes both, so what is the difference? Let me tell you how I view and compare these two Microsoft offerings.

Office 365 includes an integrated MDM feature, while Intune is a stand-alone, Office 365 platform. Maybe you want to think of MDM as a part of Microsoft Intune to understand the difference better.

MDM is not technically related to Intune, and it’s not a subset of Intune. The only reason I said I thought this was because Intune offers everything, plus more, MDM for Office 365. Intune is a mobile administration platform based on the cloud.

Intune is a comprehensive solution, which offers not just MDM, but also MAM. For companies supporting Bring your device (BYOD), MAM is particularly useful because it allows you to deploy and manage mobile apps. Intune options:

Because Intune incorporates many Offices 365 services in many ways, it gives you much more control over your mobile devices. It can deploy business apps, Microsoft Store apps, and even certificates, Wi-Fi, VPN, and email profiles. Intune also includes the Intune Managed Browser, which enables users to navigate the web securely. The following architecture demonstrates the integration of Microsoft Intune with Microsoft Azure.

Let’s compare Office 365 Intune and Microsoft Intune. The table below is based on information from Microsoft and gives you a much better idea of which solution is the best fit for you.