OneDrive for Business to get unlimited storage for enterprise customers

Microsoft has gone against its promise of unlimited OneDrive for Business storage for all organizations, announcing that only premium Office 365 subscribers will get access to limitless cloud storage.

The reason Microsoft is forced to acknowledge these customer expectations is because in October 2014, the company heavily insinuated that all OneDrive for Business customers would be receiving unlimited storage as part of the company’s ongoing roadmap for the service.

Some business, government, and education customers will receive increased storage, even unlimited amounts for certain plans. An unlimited storage capability will gradually roll out to some OneDrive for Business customers starting at the end of this month, according to an announcement by Jeff Teper, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for OneDrive and SharePoint.

In addition, people who want to use OneDrive for Business to enable real-time collaboration on documents in the Word 2016 client app will have to open any document they collaborate on in either the applications File Open menu or through the OneDrive for Business web interface.

Microsoft’s storage plan changes also come alongside a number of product updates, including the launch of a new sync client for Windows and Mac, the announcement of upcoming support for offline storage on OneDrive for iOS and new developer tools. It’s also compatible with Windows 7, 8.1 and 10, along with Mac OS versions 10.9 and later. OneDrive for Windows 10 Mobile recently received an update that supports all of the needed viewing, editing, deleting, sharing, and uploading functionality for OneDrive consumer and OneDrive for Business.

An updated OneDrive for iOS mobile app will be available at the end of this month. The Windows 10 Mobile client will also receive the same capability but not until second quarter next year.

Finally, the Office Lens app for iOS will enable the direct uploading of content to OneDrive for Business. Microsoft also promised that it will make the migration from the existing sync client easier for end users, an improvement expected in “the first quarter of 2016”. Other new development options and SDKs are detailed over at the newly introduced OneDrive developer portal. In the meantime, they can enjoy their (soon to be) unlimited storage while consumer OneDrive users are still nursing their wounds. Windows 10 Mobile owners can now view, edit, create, share and upload files using the OneDrive client to their personal or OneDrive for Business accounts.