ChatGPT Business vs Enterprise: Which Fits Your Company?

ChatGPT Business (formerly ChatGPT Team) is the self-serve company plan: 2 to 200 paid seats, card billing, $25 per Standard seat per month or $20 billed annually as of October 2026, with SAML or OIDC single sign-on, domain verification, an admin console and no training on your data by default. ChatGPT Enterprise is the sales-led plan with custom pricing, annual contracts and invoicing, and it adds the controls larger or regulated companies ask for: SCIM provisioning, role-based access, the Compliance Platform, custom retention, data residency, IP allowlisting and enterprise key management. If you need any of those, or more than 200 seats, you need Enterprise. Otherwise Business covers most companies under about 200 people.

This page compares the two company plans. The choice between a company workspace and personal Plus or Pro seats is covered in ChatGPT Business vs Plus and Pro, and the full Business cost picture in ChatGPT Business pricing.

What is the difference between ChatGPT Business and Enterprise?

OpenAI publishes a feature matrix on its business pricing page. Condensed to the rows that change a decision, as of October 2026:

How do identity and user management differ?

Business includes more identity than people expect. OpenAI's Business SSO article says SSO and domain verification are included, with SAML and OIDC both supported, and a workspace owner configures them inside ChatGPT. What Business lacks is SCIM: no synchronized groups and no automatic directory provisioning. Joiners are invited and leavers are removed by hand, although once SSO is in place a disabled identity-provider account can no longer sign in. Business also has two defaults to review: workspace discovery is on, so anyone with a verified-domain email can find and request to join the workspace, and members can invite other members, which OpenAI says cannot currently be restricted.

Enterprise identity lives in the Admin Console at admin.openai.com, run by a global admin, with Okta, Microsoft Entra ID and custom SAML or OIDC options and a sign-in policy per product of Required, Optional or Off. SCIM provisioning, per OpenAI's SCIM article, supports Okta, Microsoft Entra ID, Google Workspace, PingFederate, OneLogin and Rippling, with most providers syncing every 30 to 40 minutes, and it is not available on standalone Business. Workspace discovery is off by default on Enterprise. The configuration steps for both plans are in ChatGPT SSO setup for Business and Enterprise.

What administration and compliance controls does Enterprise add?

• Role-based access control. Enterprise custom roles decide who may use which models, create and share GPTs, use Canvas, Projects, Memory, link sharing and ChatGPT Work locally or in the cloud. Business has the four built-in roles and workspace-wide toggles.
• Compliance Platform. Enterprise and Edu only. OpenAI's Compliance Platform article describes an append-only event log plus a stateful API that connect to eDiscovery, DLP and SIEM tools, with named integrations including Microsoft Purview, Netskope, Zscaler, Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike and Varonis.
• Retention. Admins on both plans control how long data is kept, and deleted conversations are removed within 30 days. The difference shows when someone leaves: Enterprise follows the configured policy (indefinite, or a period such as 90 or 180 days), while on Business a removed member's chats and files are retained indefinitely.
• Sharing controls. Enterprise can disable shared links workspace-wide and set granular GPT and group permissions; Business shared links already stay inside the workspace but cannot be switched off.
• Network and key controls. IP allowlisting for the workspace and the Compliance API, Lockdown Mode for a role, Enterprise Key Management with your own AWS, Google Cloud or Azure keys, and data residency in ten regions are Enterprise features.
• Certifications. Both plans have a SOC 2 Type 2 report. OpenAI's pricing table marks ISO 27001, 27017, 27018 and 27701 certification as Yes for Enterprise and No for Business, and OpenAI's trust portal lists the ISO 27001 scope as the API, ChatGPT Enterprise and ChatGPT Edu.

One control neither plan has: enforced multi-factor authentication. OpenAI says MFA cannot be enforced at the workspace level on either plan, so it is enforced through your identity provider with SSO.

Do apps, custom GPTs and Projects work the same on both?

Mostly, with different defaults. Connected apps (Google Drive, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Outlook, Slack, GitHub and others) are enabled by default on Business, where an admin decides workspace-wide availability; new Enterprise workspaces start with a selected set and admins assign apps per role, restrict SharePoint site collections or sensitivity labels, and can stop verified-domain accounts from connecting work data to personal ChatGPT. On both plans ChatGPT respects the permissions a user already has in the source, each user authenticates to the app themselves, and Microsoft apps need an Entra administrator to consent to the ChatGPT application. Custom MCP servers are available on both; on Business only admins and owners can publish them.

Custom GPTs can be created on both plans, with Enterprise adding per-group permissions and an action domain allowlist. Note the date: OpenAI's GPT retirement notice schedules custom GPTs to retire on December 11, 2026 in favor of plugins, so new builds belong in Projects, plugins or workspace agents. Shared projects, workspace agents, Company Knowledge and ChatGPT in Slack and Microsoft Teams are available on both plans.

How much does ChatGPT Enterprise cost?

OpenAI does not publish a ChatGPT Enterprise price. Its pricing page lists Enterprise as custom pricing with a contact-sales button, offers credit-based and token-based agreements, and mentions invoicing and volume discounts. OpenAI's What is ChatGPT Enterprise article adds that the plan is bought at the organization level, that individuals cannot sign up directly, and that seat additions on seat-bundled credit contracts are reconciled through quarterly true-ups. None of the official pages we opened states an Enterprise price per user or a minimum seat count, so any figure you see elsewhere is a quote someone received, not a list price. For a budget, Business at list price is the floor; nonprofits can ask about OpenAI's discount of up to 75 percent on either plan.

When does a company need Enterprise instead of Business?

Any one of these is enough:

• More than 200 paid seats.
• A policy or auditor that requires automatic provisioning and deprovisioning through SCIM.
• A retention period you must set, a legal hold, or conversation logs that must flow to a DLP, SIEM or eDiscovery tool.
• A contract that requires data stored outside the United States.
• Protected health information, because Business has no BAA and the HIPAA-eligible products (ChatGPT for Healthcare, ChatGPT Enterprise with Regulated Workspace and others) are sales-led plans.
• Finance that must pay by invoice or purchase order.
• A need to switch off shared links, restrict features per group, allowlist IP ranges or hold your own encryption keys.
• A client security questionnaire that asks for an ISO 27001 certificate covering the product.

Starting on Business is not a dead end. OpenAI's Business FAQ says upgrading a Business workspace to Enterprise while keeping its data goes through sales. What is not supported is merging two Business workspaces into one, so a company with several departmental workspaces should plan the consolidation before it grows.

Selection checklist

1. Headcount now and in 18 months, against the 200-seat Business cap.
2. Identity: SSO is on both plans; do you also require SCIM?
3. Retention: must you set a custom period or produce conversation records on request?
4. Compliance evidence: SOC 2 Type 2 is on both; do clients or auditors require ISO 27001 scope or Compliance Platform logs?
5. Residency: does any contract require storage in a specific region?
6. Procurement: card monthly or annual, or invoice with negotiated terms?
7. Support: is standard support enough, or do you need 24/7 support with SLAs?
8. Apps: which systems must ChatGPT reach, and do you need per-role app assignment or content restrictions?
9. Usage: will heavy users exhaust Standard seats, and is Premium enough, or do you need a contract credit pool?

Frequently asked questions

Is ChatGPT Teams the same as ChatGPT Enterprise?

No. ChatGPT Team was the former name of ChatGPT Business, renamed on August 29, 2025. Enterprise is the separate, sales-led plan. A Team vs Enterprise comparison is this Business vs Enterprise comparison.

How much does ChatGPT Enterprise cost per user?

OpenAI has not published a per-user Enterprise price as of October 2026. Pricing is custom, agreed with its sales team, on credit-based or token-based terms, with seat changes reconciled quarterly on seat-bundled contracts.

What is the minimum number of seats for ChatGPT Enterprise?

No minimum is stated on OpenAI's public pricing or help pages as of October 2026; it is part of the quote. Business has a published range of 2 to 200 paid seats.

Does ChatGPT Business have SSO?

Yes. SAML and OIDC single sign-on and domain verification are included with ChatGPT Business and configured by a workspace owner. SCIM provisioning is not included.

Does ChatGPT Enterprise train on our data?

No, by default, and the same is true of Business. Enterprise adds custom retention, Enterprise Key Management, the Compliance Platform and data residency on top of that default.

Does ChatGPT Business offer data residency?

OpenAI's pricing comparison lists data residency as an Enterprise feature, while a Business help article says residency is being rolled out gradually and is chosen at checkout where available, with abuse-monitoring logs stored in the United States regardless. Treat it as Enterprise unless checkout offers it.

How NetSys helps you choose and set up

The Business-or-Enterprise decision usually comes down to three requirements: identity, retention and procurement. NetSys engineers work through the checklist above with you against your Microsoft 365 or Google tenant, your compliance obligations and your headcount, then set up the workspace you choose under our ChatGPT Business setup service, including domain verification, SSO, data controls and the first shared projects. If Enterprise is the answer, we prepare the requirements list you take to OpenAI's sales team and handle the technical side once the contract is signed. We are vendor-neutral across ChatGPT, Microsoft 365 Copilot and Claude, so the recommendation is only about fit.

NetSys engineers turn this checklist into a written recommendation for your company: discuss your company requirements before you commit to either plan.