OneDrive for Business is a personal library intended for storing and organizing your work documents. As an integral part of Office 365 or SharePoint Server 2013, OneDrive for Business lets you work within the context of your organization, with features such as direct access to your organization’s address book.

 Note    OneDrive for Business is different from OneDrive, which is intended for personal storage separate from your workplace. OneDrive for Business is also different from your team site, which is intended for storing team or project-related documents.

Video: Get to know OneDrive for Business

Store your work documents and related files

If you’re using Office 365, you get 1 TB (1,000 GB) of space in the cloud for OneDrive for Business. If your OneDrive for Business library is hosted on a SharePoint server in your organization, your organization’s administrators determine how much storage space is available.

All files that you store in OneDrive for Business are private initially – only you can see them – unless you decide to share them. You can easily share a file with everyone in your organization by placing it in the Shared with Everyone folder, for example. You can also share files with specified co-workers so you can collaborate on projects. If you’re signed-in to Office 365, you may even be able to share with partners outside of your organization, depending on what your company allows.

To use your OneDrive for Business library, select OneDrive (short for OneDrive for Business) in the header at the top of a SharePoint or Office 365 page.

OneDrive for Business is provided to you through your organization’s subscription to SharePoint Online in Office 365 or through an on-premises installation of SharePoint Server 2013.

To learn more about the OneDrive for Business library, see:

• Manage your information
• Video: Add documents to OneDrive for Business
• Storage space allowances and other software limits in SharePoint Online

Top of Page

Sync OneDrive for Business to your computer

The OneDrive for Business sync app lets you synchronize your OneDrive for Business library or other SharePoint site libraries to your local computer. This sync app is available with Office 2013 or with Office 365 subscriptions that include Office 2013 applications. If you don’t have Office 2013, a free download of the OneDrive for Business sync app is also available.

To sync OneDrive for Business, sign in to Office 365 or SharePoint, select OneDrive at the top of the page, and then click Sync.

You’ll find your synchronized files in your File Explorer, under Favorites. If you’re syncing an Office 365 OneDrive for Business library, your synchronized files appear in the OneDrive@<organization> folder. Work on them locally if you like and your changes will be synchronized automatically with your OneDrive for Business library when you’re online.

Top of Page

How is OneDrive for Business different from OneDrive?

Microsoft offers another storage service called OneDrive. You may already be using OneDrive to store documents and other content in the cloud. This service is different from OneDrive for Business:

• OneDrive is free online personal storage that you get with either a Microsoft account or Outlook.com. Use OneDrive to  save documents, photos, and other files in the cloud, share them with friends, and even collaborate on content. You’re free to decide how you want to use it.
• OneDrive for Business is online storage intended for business purposes. Your OneDrive for Business library is managed by your organization and lets you share and collaborate on work documents with co-workers. Site collection administrators in your organization control what you can do in the library.

 Note    In the header or elsewhere on your SharePoint or Office 365 site, ‘OneDrive’ appears as an abbreviation of OneDrive for Business to keep things simpler.

Top of Page

Learn more

For more information about using OneDrive for Business and the OneDrive for Business sync app: