Microsoft 365 Business Standard now costs AU$21 per user per month in Australia, a 12% jump, while Business Premium has stayed at AU$32.90. If your business hasn't renewed since 1 July 2026, you're still on the old price — but your next renewal, whenever it falls, will pick up the increase automatically unless you review your plan first. For a Perth business with 15 or 20 staff, that's an extra few hundred dollars a year landing on autopilot.
What actually changed
Microsoft's Australian price update took effect on 1 July 2026 across a range of commercial Microsoft 365 and Office 365 plans, with increases reported between roughly 5% and 33% depending on the plan. Business Standard moved from around $18.75 to $21.00 per user per month (ex GST), and Enterprise plans like E3 and E5 also rose. Business Premium and Office 365 E1, by contrast, held their existing price.
Importantly, this wasn't a single cutover date for every customer. If you're on an annual or multi-year agreement, you keep your current pricing until your next renewal — not from 1 July itself. So a business that renews in October is still paying the old rate right now, and will only see the new figure show up when that renewal processes. That's easy to miss, because nothing changes in your invoice until it suddenly does.
Why the gap between plans now matters more
The practical effect of this round of changes is that Business Premium and Business Standard are much closer in price than they used to be — around $11.90 per user per month apart, or roughly $143 per user per year. Before the increase, that gap was wider, which made Standard the obvious "good enough" choice for a lot of small offices.
Business Premium includes Microsoft Defender for Business, Intune device management, and conditional access — the tools that actually stop a stolen laptop or a phished login from turning into a full breach. For many Perth businesses, especially anyone handling client financial data, health records, or trust accounting, that gap is now small enough that staying on Standard purely to save money is a harder case to make than it was a year ago.
What to check before your renewal lands
A few minutes now avoids an unpleasant surprise on your next invoice:
- Find your actual renewal date. It's in the Microsoft 365 admin centre under Billing, or your IT provider can pull it for you. This is the date the new pricing applies to you, not 1 July.
- Audit who's actually using what they're licensed for. It's common for a business to be paying for Business Premium seats for staff who never touch the security features, or Standard seats for people who'd benefit from Premium's protection. A quick per-user review often finds savings that offset some or all of the increase.
- Check for unused or duplicate licences. Ex-staff, old test accounts, and shared mailboxes sometimes carry a full paid licence long after anyone needs it.
- Ask about annual vs monthly commitment. Annual commitment pricing is generally cheaper per user than paying month-to-month — worth confirming you're on the right billing cycle before you lock in another 12 months.
- Compare Premium against Standard plus add-ons. If you're bolting extra security products onto Standard already, buying Premium outright can work out cheaper than the sum of the parts.
The bigger picture
None of this is a reason to panic — but it is a reason to look, deliberately, before the renewal happens rather than after. Microsoft licensing rarely shrinks a bill on its own, and a plan that was the right fit two years ago isn't automatically the right fit now that the pricing and the feature set have both moved.
If you'd like a second set of eyes on your Microsoft 365 licensing before your renewal date, our Microsoft 365 services team can run a quick licence audit and tell you plainly whether you're paying for the right plan. It's part of the wider managed IT services we've provided Perth businesses since 1997, and if you're comparing what different support arrangements actually cost, our Perth MSP pricing guide is a useful starting point. Get in touch and we'll take a look.
