OneDrive vs SharePoint: Which One Should Your Business Use?

If you've ever stared at Microsoft 365 wondering whether to save a file in OneDrive or SharePoint, you're not alone. These two platforms look similar, they both store files in the cloud, and they're both part of the same subscription. So what's the actual difference, and when should you use each one?

The short answer: OneDrive is your personal filing cabinet. SharePoint is your team's shared workspace.

Let's break down what that means in practice.

What OneDrive is for

OneDrive is personal cloud storage tied to your individual account. Everything you save there is private by default, only accessible to you unless you explicitly share it with someone else. Think of it as "My Documents" in the cloud.

This makes OneDrive ideal for:

• Work in progress that isn't ready for the wider team yet. Draft proposals, research notes, and documents you're still shaping before anyone else needs to see them.
• Personal reference files that mainly support your own work. Performance reviews, your personal task lists, or notes from meetings.
• Quick sharing with a handful of people for review or feedback. When you need someone to look at something temporarily, OneDrive's simple sharing links work well.

The key characteristic is ownership: OneDrive content belongs to you. When you leave the company, that content typically needs migrating or eventually gets deleted, because it was never meant to be permanent organisational knowledge.

What SharePoint is for

SharePoint, by contrast, is built for teams and organisations. It's structured around sites, document libraries, and shared workspaces where content lives independently of any single person. Files stored in SharePoint belong to the team or department, not to whoever uploaded them.

SharePoint makes sense when:

• Files belong to the team, not an individual. HR policies, project documentation, client files, and anything that needs to stay accessible regardless of staff changes.
• You need structured collaboration. Version history, approval workflows, metadata tagging, and formal processes that go beyond simply sharing a file.
• You're building an intranet or department hub. SharePoint supports pages, news posts, calendars, task lists, and all the features needed for a team or company site.

The crucial difference is permanence and structure. SharePoint content persists at the site level, which makes it far better for long-term organisational records and knowledge.

How they work with Microsoft Teams

Here's where it gets interesting: when you create a Team in Microsoft Teams, Microsoft automatically creates a SharePoint site behind it. The files you upload to Team channels actually live in SharePoint, not in anyone's OneDrive.

This is intentional design. Teams channels are for ongoing collaboration around shared work, so the files need to live somewhere permanent and team-owned. That's SharePoint's job.

Your personal chat files in Teams, however, do use OneDrive, because those are individual conversations rather than team collaboration.

The practical difference: permissions

OneDrive files are private by default. You control access file by file, sharing with specific people as needed. This gives you complete control but means everyone's working from their own isolated storage.

SharePoint works the opposite way: content is shared by default with everyone who has access to the site. You set permissions at the site, library, or folder level, and team members automatically see what they need. This supports consistent access without constantly managing individual shares.

When to use which: real examples

Use OneDrive for:

• Your personal performance notes before your annual review
• Draft blog posts or proposals you're still working on
• Research materials and reference documents you mainly use alone
• Files you need to quickly share with one or two people for temporary review

Use SharePoint for:

• Company policies that everyone needs to access
• Client project folders that multiple team members work on
• Department templates and standard operating procedures
• Any file that should remain available when someone leaves the team
• Content that needs workflows, approvals, or formal version control

Quick comparison

AspectOneDriveSharePointMain purposePersonal cloud storage for individualsTeam content and collaboration hubDefault visibilityPrivate unless sharedShared with site membersStructureSimple folders tied to your accountSites, libraries, pages, workflowsCollaborationBasic sharing and co-authoringAdvanced workflows, version control, metadataOwnershipTied to your user accountTied to the team or site, not individualsBest forDrafts, personal docs, ad-hoc sharingDepartment files, projects, long-term content

The rule of thumb

Ask yourself: "If I left the company tomorrow, should this file stay?"

If yes, it belongs in SharePoint. If no, keep it in OneDrive.

Or put another way: OneDrive is for files that support your individual work. SharePoint is for files that support the team's work.

Getting it right in your business

Many businesses we work with initially treat OneDrive and SharePoint as interchangeable, which creates chaos over time. Files end up scattered between personal OneDrives, shared libraries, and Teams channels with no clear logic.

The fix is establishing clear guidelines about what goes where, usually based on ownership and longevity. Personal work-in-progress goes in OneDrive. Team files, client projects, and anything with multiple collaborators goes in SharePoint.

Once people understand this distinction, Microsoft 365 becomes far more organised and usable. Your team stops wasting time hunting for files, and important documents stop disappearing when someone leaves.

If you're struggling to get SharePoint and OneDrive working properly for your London business, we can help. As Apple and Microsoft 365 specialists, we set up these platforms so they actually make sense for how your team works.

How this works on macOS

If you're using Macs in your business, understanding how OneDrive and SharePoint work together becomes even more important, because the OneDrive app for macOS handles both.

The OneDrive app does double duty

On a Mac, you install the OneDrive app, which appears in your menu bar and creates a folder in Finder. What's not immediately obvious is that this single app syncs both your personal OneDrive files and SharePoint libraries you've chosen to sync.

This means your Mac's OneDrive folder actually contains:

• Your personal OneDrive - the files stored in your individual cloud storage
• Synced SharePoint libraries - team folders you've chosen to make available offline

Both appear in Finder under the OneDrive folder, but they're pulling from different sources. Your personal files live in your OneDrive cloud storage. The SharePoint libraries are syncing from team sites.

Adding SharePoint libraries to your Mac

When you open a SharePoint site in your browser and view a document library, you'll see a "Sync" button at the top. Click that, and the OneDrive app adds that library to your Mac's Finder, creating a shortcut directly to the team's files.

These synced SharePoint libraries appear alongside your personal OneDrive in Finder, usually under a section labelled "SharedLibraries" or with the organisation name. You can open, edit, and save files just like they were local, but they're actually syncing to SharePoint in the background.

This is incredibly useful for team folders you access regularly. Instead of opening a browser and navigating to SharePoint every time, you simply work in Finder. The OneDrive app handles the syncing automatically.

What this looks like in practice

Imagine you're working on a client project. The project folder lives in SharePoint because it's team-owned. You've synced that SharePoint library to your Mac using the OneDrive app.

Now when you open Finder, you see:

OneDrive - YourCompany
├── (Your personal OneDrive files)
├── Documents
├── Desktop
└── Pictures

SharedLibraries - YourCompany
├── Client Projects (SharePoint)
├── Marketing Assets (SharePoint)
└── HR Documents (SharePoint)


You can drag files between your personal OneDrive and the synced SharePoint libraries, work on documents offline, and everything syncs when you're back online. From the Mac user's perspective, it all feels like one unified cloud storage system.

The advantage for Mac businesses

This dual-purpose approach means your team doesn't need separate apps for personal and shared storage. The OneDrive app handles both, which keeps things simple and reduces the cognitive load on users.

It also means macOS features like Spotlight search, Quick Look, and folder tagging work across both personal OneDrive files and synced SharePoint libraries. Your team can find files using their normal Mac workflows rather than learning SharePoint's web interface.

A word of caution: selective sync

The OneDrive app lets you choose which SharePoint libraries to sync to your Mac. This is critical for performance and storage management.

Don't sync everything. Only sync the SharePoint libraries you actively work with. If your SharePoint site contains 500GB of historical project files but you only need the current client folders, sync only those specific libraries.

You can always access other SharePoint content through the web browser when needed, but keeping your synced libraries lean means your Mac isn't constantly downloading and storing files you rarely touch.

Files On-Demand: the clever bit

Both personal OneDrive and synced SharePoint libraries support Files On-Demand on macOS. This means files appear in Finder but don't take up space on your Mac until you open them.

You'll see cloud icons next to files that aren't downloaded yet. Click to open one, and macOS downloads it automatically. Recently used files stay cached locally for quick access, while files you haven't touched in weeks get removed from your Mac but remain visible in Finder.

This lets you sync large SharePoint libraries without filling your Mac's SSD, which is particularly useful if you're working with a 256GB MacBook Pro and your SharePoint site contains terabytes of design files and project archives.

The Teams connection on Mac

When you're working in Microsoft Teams on Mac and someone shares a file in a channel, that file lives in the team's SharePoint library. If you've synced that SharePoint library to your Mac via the OneDrive app, you can access the same file through Finder without opening Teams or a browser.

This creates a nice workflow: collaborate in Teams when you need the chat and meeting context, or jump straight to Finder when you just need to work on files without the distraction of notifications and channels.

Setting this up properly

For Mac-based businesses, we typically recommend:

1. Install the OneDrive app on every Mac during onboarding, configured to sync personal OneDrive by default
2. Identify core SharePoint libraries each person needs (usually 2-4 libraries per person)
3. Set up selective sync so people only get the SharePoint content relevant to their role
4. Enable Files On-Demand to prevent storage issues on smaller SSDs
5. Train people on the difference between their personal OneDrive section and synced SharePoint libraries in Finder

When this is configured correctly, your team gets seamless access to both personal and shared files without thinking about where things are stored. The OneDrive app handles the complexity invisibly.

If you're running Macs and struggling to get OneDrive and SharePoint working smoothly across your team, this is exactly the kind of setup we handle for London businesses. Get it right once, and everyone benefits from clean, fast access to the files they need.