This article offers precisely that, broken down into the following sections:
- An overview of intranet software (including ROI considerations)
- The intranet features that matter (from table stakes to key differentiators)
- Review methodology (and the analyst reports included)
- Top intranet platform providers and how they stack up
- Final verdict (including trade-offs to consider)
An overview: Understanding intranet platforms
Let’s start by setting some parameters — what an intranet platform is (and isn’t), and why these platforms are so important in modern business operations. We’ll also explain the two main types of intranet software and some of the key features that define a modern intranet platform.
What is an intranet? Definition of intranet software
Intranet software is an application that drives a private network system (an intranet) used within a company or organization. It’s designed to serve as a centralized portal for employees to share information, collaborate on projects, and increase productivity. Much like the internet, the intranet enables users to share and view files, but with a higher level of security and privacy. Only employees and other organizational stakeholders can access the intranet, and each user is assigned specific permissions.
What are intranet platforms?
Intranet platforms are intranet software solutions that can deploy an intranet for an organization. The terms intranet platform, intranet software and intranet solution are used interchangeably throughout this article.
The advantages of using an intranet
An intranet offers many organizational advantages — starting with efficient communication, secure information exchange and improved collaboration. An intranet can also be a great tool for onboarding, training, shaping corporate culture, and sharing resources.
And for a distributed workforce, an effective intranet is critical for keeping employees connected, informed and aligned — no matter where they work.
Why choose the best platform for your intranet?
There are three intranet software differentiators that can significantly impact your organization’s return on investment (ROI):
- The type of intranet software (building vs. buying)
- The features it offers (from basic to advanced)
- Design and integrations (for widespread adoption)
The following sections walk through each differentiator.
The two main types of intranet software
Modern intranet platforms integrate with myriad solutions for communications, collaboration, project management, HR management, document sharing and much more. They can even offer AI interfaces that let employees handle routine tasks like scheduling vacation time or uploading expenses by speaking or chatting naturally on their phone — in over 130 languages.
Given the extreme specialization of today’s best intranet platforms — and the resources required to build and maintain them — most companies see a far better ROI from partnering with a dedicated third-party intranet provider.
Learn more about employee intranet software: Features that matter
Employee intranet software features
Traditional intranets are associated as being communications or productivity solutions, such as internal messaging or project management.
The best intranet platforms will connect your employees to (and integrate with) all the essential tools they need in a single communications portal:
- Company news and communications
- Internal messaging
- Video management
- Information management
- Project management
- Document management
- Human resources software
- Data collection, storage and analysis
Additional employee intranet features
When it comes to modern intranet platforms, the list above represents “table stakes” — the bare minimum required to be considered an effective intranet platform. The following additional features take an intranet platform further, distinguishing it from competitors:
- Auto-Governance Engine: An intranet should be able to monitor for out-of-date content so its usefulness doesn’t diminish over time.
- Federated Search: Search functionality should be personalized and powered by artificial intelligence (AI) to help users find exactly what they need quickly and easily.
- Employee Listening: Your intranet should leverage AI to unearth key insights in real time, keeping your finger on the pulse of employee sentiment.
- Native Video: Given the importance of video in news, onboarding, training and more, a top intranet platform should offer integrated video capabilities.
- Personalized Feeds: Like today’s most engaging social media, your intranet should surface content that’s uniquely interesting to each individual employee.
- AI Virtual Assistant: At the cutting edge of AI, your intranet should let users talk to or chat with it in their own native language (over 133 and counting).
How do I get employees to use an intranet?
To maximize the ROI of your intranet implementation, user adoption is everything.
That’s why we can’t overstate the importance of user-friendly features and an easy-to-use, mobile-friendly design. The ideal intranet includes an app that works natively on the devices your employees carry around in their pockets.
Employee intranet user satisfaction
The other thing you can’t overlook is the list of plug-and-play integrations. A successful intranet rollout depends on your intranet software integrating with the popular solutions your employees already use — Slack, Zoom, Google Drive, Dropbox, Workday, Google Analytics, LinkedIn and more.
Choosing the best intranet platform: Analyst reports approach
Next, let’s drill into review methodology — we used authoritative analyst reports to compare the best intranet platforms. The reports include:
- 2023 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Intranet Packaged Solutions
- Forrester Wave™: Intranet platforms, Q2 2024
- G2 Grid® Report for Employee Intranet | Winter 2024
Understanding analyst reports
Analyst reports are independent, in-depth evaluations of industry-leading solutions — in this case, for intranet software. The strength of these reports lies in clear metrics and methodologies.
The Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ is a research methodology and graphical representation that provides an analysis of a market’s direction, maturity, and participants on completeness of vision and the ability to execute that vision. It is published by Gartner, Inc., a global research and advisory firm that specializes in providing insights and analysis for various technology-related markets.
The Forrester Wave offers a consistent methodology and transparent scoring across three high-level categories: current offering, strategy, and market presence.
G2 uses a proprietary scoring algorithm based on structured, user-generated ratings across a variety of variables as well as open commentary and reviews.
Intranet platform selection: Key criteria and requirements
The Gartner Magic Quadrant report is very specific regarding key criteria and requirements. It considered intranet packaged solutions that are “delivered as an integrated assembly of capabilities geared specifically for intranet use cases.” Those that did not include content services, a common UI framework, security and access management (at a bare minimum) were disqualified.
The Forrester Wave report includes only cloud-first intranet platforms with a minimum annual product revenue of $10M, marketed as solutions for intranet and employee communications, scalable to 5,000+ employees, and with active interest among Forrester clients.
The G2 report differs in that it is based on customer-based reviews (vs. reviews based on analyst research). It allows software to be included in multiple categories, and (as of the time of this writing) includes 201 “employee intranet” software products. That includes software that’s designed for building intranets along with packaged solutions, as well as software that merely touches on the category rather than being holistic intranet solutions.
Guidelines to select the ideal intranet software
The best intranet software should be considered a leader by both independent evaluators with strict methodologies and G2, which gathers real-world user ratings.
Top intranet platforms and solution providers reviewed: The best of the best
Leveraging data from these industry-leading reports, here’s an in-depth analysis of the seven top intranet platforms. Based on the independent analyst reports, the best intranet platform providers include Simpplr, Unily, Workvivo, LumApps, Staffbase, Interact and Igloo.
Simpplr: The only named leader across all three reports
According to the Gartner report, Simpplr leads the pack along both axes — completeness of vision and ability to execute — making it the best intranet platform. Its particular strengths include:
- Delivering a cohesive, personalized employee experience regardless of where employees work
- Incorporating technology innovation rapidly, in a controlled, deliberate way
- Being “simple” to acquire, deploy and use
- Showing greater user awareness and adoption of product capabilities
- Adopted more frequently than most other providers across both office and frontline worker use cases
In a companion report also released by Gartner regarding critical capabilities across six use cases, Simpplr edged out all competitors in five of the six use cases reported:
- 1st place: Employee communications and engagement
- 1st place: Employee services
- 1st place: Knowledge services
- 1st place: Work management
- 1st place: Frontline worker support
Simpplr ranked fourth for the one remaining use case — application portals.
Read the full Gartner Critical Capabilities report
In the Forrester report as well, Simpplr is recognized as a Leader for its strong strategy and impressive current offering.
Simpplr received the highest scores possible for AI and machine learning and several other key criteria, including metadata support, governance, dashboards and reporting, developer resources, and surveys. Its lowest scores were for market presence — number of customers and revenue, both of which are expected to rise as more companies discover Simpplr’s industry leadership.
According to the Forrester report, “Simpplr has strong AI/ML capabilities that facilitate deep personalization of an employee’s news feeds based on role, topic, or other context to deliver relevant information. Other strengths include automation of content governance, rich metadata, and reporting tools. Areas of weakness include native collaboration tools, with thin offerings for team workspaces/communities of interest.”
The bottom line? “Forrester recommends Simpplr for large and midsize enterprises seeking a cutting-edge cloud intranet within the Google or Microsoft ecosystem. Organizations with over 1,000 employees, including remote and mobile workers, should consider Simpplr for its exceptional AI and communication capabilities.”
Read the full Forrester Wave report
In G2, only eight of the 200+ contenders appear in the top quadrant, meaning they’re strong in both user satisfaction and market presence. Of these eight, Simpplr’s position in the grid leads them all in “satisfaction” except Microsoft’s SharePoint — which is for building an intranet, not buying one. In the individual list, however, Simpplr’s ratings lead SharePoint’s by quite a bit across all four of the user satisfaction categories reported. Simpplr received overall user ratings of:
- 9.4: Quality of support
- 9.4: Ease of use
- 9.5: Being a good partner in doing business
- 9.0: Ease of administration
SharePoint, by comparison, received scores of 7.9 for quality of support, 7.7 for ease of use, 8.2 for being a good business partner, and 7.5 for ease of admin.
See the full G2 grid and report
Unily
According to Gartner, UK-based Unily offers several strengths despite ranking behind Simpplr in both completeness of vision and ability to execute:
- Wide-ranging components, from templates to preconfigured integrations
- Applying real-life, emerging concerns for enterprises and their customers
- An external knowledge and community platform, called Universe, that can be extended in combination with customers’ intranet
Gartner cautions, however, that work and task management is not as comprehensive as some competitors, especially for frontline and hybrid workers. It also reports that customer support is sometimes slower than expected.
In the Gartner use-case report, Unily also performed well:
- 2nd place: Employee communications and engagement
- 2nd place: Employee services
- 1st place: Application portals
- 2nd place: Knowledge services
- 4th place: Work management
- 4th place: Frontline worker support
Unily is ranked among the leaders in the Forrester report, excelling in current offerings and strategy. Launched initially as a SharePoint add-on, Unily has evolved into a robust cloud-native intranet and internal communication platform for global enterprises. According to Forrester, “Unily’s strengths include a well-resourced roadmap that its customers influence, focuses on automation, broadens its application integrations, and improves data insights. Areas of weakness include native collaboration that offers support for communities and frontline worker coordination but depends on integrations with third-party tools such as Microsoft Teams, Slack, or digital whiteboards.” Reference customers also reported “some concern about extra costs for new features.”
Among G2 reviewers, Unily did not rank in the top quadrant. In G2’s four user satisfaction categories, Unily’s overall user ratings were below Simpplr’s ratings across the board, although Unily was only slightly behind Simpplr in ease of use:
- 8.7: Quality of support
- 9.2: Ease of use
- 8.1: Being a good partner in doing business
- 8.5: Ease of administration
Workvivo
According to Gartner, Workvivo focuses primarily on community and communications. Acquired by Zoom in April 2023, Workvivo received “a significant boost in overall viability and market awareness.” However, it was not in the top three for any of Gartner’s intranet critical capabilities:
- 4th place: Employee communications and engagement
- 9th place: Employee services
- 8th place: Application portals
- 5th place: Knowledge services
- 8th place: Work management
- 8th place: Frontline worker support
Forrester recognized Workvivo as a strong performer. Acquired by Zoom in 2023, Workvivo faces the challenge of maintaining balance across its priorities, such as expanding integration for clients in the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, while capitalizing on new bundling opportunities across the Zoom portfolio. According to Forrester, “strengths include integration with major productivity suites, employee survey tools such as templates and builders, as well as trend reports. Weaknesses include the breadth of its developer resources and support for an AI-based intelligent agent, which was not generally available at the time of this evaluation.” Reference customers tend to be “less happy with workflow automation such as journeys and the breadth of developer tools.”
Workvivo was not included in the top quadrant of the G2 report. It did, however, perform well on G2 for user satisfaction:
- 9.6: Quality of support
- 9.6: Ease of use
- 9.8: Being a good partner in doing business
- 9.6: Ease of administration
Notably, Workvivo appears to be behind when it comes to AI. It has announced plans to release an AI assistant in 2024, but the announcement suggests that the AI will be limited to generative writing capabilities, such as those already available across numerous inexpensive AI applications, rather than being able to perform actual tasks for employees.
LumApps
LumApps was included as a top intranet platform in the Gartner report, with particular strengths in the end-user experience. Cautions, however, included “greater-than-expected development, deployment and design effort” as well as potential redundancy with “those on Microsoft 365 or Microsoft’s roadmap,” which could create additional work for customers in defining which products and vendors to use for what purposes.
For Gartner’s critical intranet capabilities, LumApps ranked 3rd in five of the six:
- 6th place: Employee communications and engagement
- 3rd place: Employee services
- 3rd place: Application portals
- 3rd place: Knowledge services
- 3rd place: Work management
- 3rd place: Frontline worker support
In Forrester, LumApps is recognized as a leader alongside Simpplr and Unily. While it ranks closely to Simpplr in current offerings, it slightly trails behind (3.46 for LumApps compared to 3.58 for Simpplr). According to Forrester, “LumApps has strong capabilities including reporting, application integration, metadata, search, and workflow-driven employee journeys. It lags in survey capabilities, which offers basic user feedback and voting but rely on third-party tools for advanced surveys and trending.” Reference customers reported less satisfaction, “with an “overwhelming” pace of new-feature rollout and add-on costs.”
In G2, LumApps did not make the top quadrant, and its user ratings fell below industry averages in every category:
- 7.9: Quality of support
- 8.2: Ease of use
- 8.8: Being a good partner in doing business
- 8.1: Ease of administration
Staffbase
Gartner reports particular intranet platform strengths for Staffbase in its “integration with Microsoft applications and development tools,” suggesting that it may be complementary for a Microsoft environment. Staffbase is also reported to be “well-equipped to support organizations with employee segments across office, plant, retail and other frontline environments.” However, it did not rank especially well across Gartner’s specific use cases:
- 7th place: Employee communications and engagement
- 6th place: Employee services
- 6th place: Application portals
- 10th place: Knowledge services
- 7th place: Work management
- 6th place: Frontline worker support
Staffbase was included in the Forrester report as a contender, highlighting its strong communication features but indicating a need to enhance core intranet functionalities. Staffbase excels in internal communication features, such as calendaring, audience segmentation, SMS support, and editing tools for email newsletters. However, it faces challenges with “limited content governance capabilities, options for content approval workflows, native file, and media management tools, as well as reporting on content freshness.” Reference customers express dissatisfaction with documentation for developers and find several aspects of its packaged reporting tools lacking.
Staffbase appeared in the top quadrant of the G2 report with strong user satisfaction ratings:
- 9.4: Quality of support
- 9.3: Ease of use
- 9.6: Being a good partner in doing business
- 9.2: Ease of administration
Interact
In the primary Gartner report, Interact received strong notes for understanding the goals and requirements of its customers during the sales and deployment stages, with noted specialties in the financial services, retail, healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. Its overall scores on Gartner’s critical intranet capabilities, however, were not as strong:
- 9th place: Employee communications and engagement
- 7th place: Employee services
- 7th place: Application portals
- 8th place: Knowledge services
- 9th place: Work management
- 9th place: Frontline worker support
In the Forrester report, Interact came in 4th overall as a “strong performer” but not an industry leader. According to Forrester, “Interact has rich capabilities and adoption services but must raise brand recognition.” Forrester also reported strengths in “repository services, search, metadata, personalization, and design tools” but highlighted shortcomings like “lack of support for complex process-driven employee journeys or multistage campaigns.” Customers were highly satisfied with its overall content authoring tools, search, and professional services but were “less satisfied with the reporting capabilities and complexity of some UIs and administrative interfaces.”
Interact appeared in the bottom quadrant of G2 despite decent ratings in the four user-satisfaction categories (albeit from only 33 total reviewers):
- 8.9: Quality of support
- 9.0: Ease of use
- 9.1: Being a good partner in doing business
- 8.3: Ease of administration
Igloo
Igloo is a “niche player” in the Gartner report, ranked in the bottom quadrant as relatively low on both completeness of vision and ability to execute. Although customers are satisfied with support and relationship building, Gartner also reported that some customers “have raised concerns over the lack of innovation in the platform and its limited mobile offering. Key features, such as enterprise search and integration with collaboration and productivity suites, are lacking compared to competitors.” In Gartner’s critical intranet use cases, Igloo ranked either last or second to last in every category:
- 14th place: Employee communications and engagement
- 14th place: Employee services
- 15th place (last): Application portals
- 14th place: Knowledge services
- 14th place: Work management
- 15th place (last): Frontline worker support
Igloo was included in the Forrester report as a challenger but significantly lagged behind other vendors. Forrester emphasized that Igloo “must not lose focus on fundamentals.” While Forrester praised its content governance for driving approval or retirement actions, design capabilities for branding, and libraries of solution templates for onboarding or knowledge management, weaknesses were noted in “survey and employee advocacy capabilities”. Igloo’s classic intranet platform falls short in “support for writing assistants and other genAI capabilities.”
The solution appears in the bottom quadrant of G2, with user satisfaction ratings that are all below industry averages:
- 8.6: Quality of support
- 8.4: Ease of use
- 8.3: Being a good partner in doing business
- 8.0: Ease of administration
Final verdict: Trade-offs and top picks
Best intranet platforms
The results are clear — Simpplr is the only intranet software that was consistently named a leader across all three reports. If your organization needs a complete, industry-leading intranet solution, both experts and customers strongly recommend Simpplr’s platform. Get a live demo of Simpplr.
Trade-offs: What you should consider
Despite these results, not every business needs a complete intranet solution. For smaller businesses that simply need better communications, a messaging system like Slack might serve your purposes well as you grow. The following trade-offs are important to consider as you weigh your options.
Cost vs. value: How much does intranet software cost?
At the end of the day, every business decision comes down to ROI. What return or benefit will your organization see from its investment?
A Forrester study designed specifically to weigh the economic impact of implementing Simpplr calculated the following:
- A total three-year ROI of 283% for the composite organization
- $2.1 million in recaptured productivity from helping employees find resources faster
- $1.2 million in productivity gains from reducing the volume of emails
- A 70% reduction in IT bandwidth used toward administering the intranet and supporting the internal comms team
Read the full Forrester economic impact report
Business needs vs. platform features
To make sure you’re maximizing your ROI, start by evaluating your internal needs. If your organization is still relatively small, it might just need a messaging platform or a product management tool. You might not need a fully integrated intranet solution. Significant ROIs from intranet software are more likely in both hard and soft returns for midsize to enterprise organizations.
Learning curve vs. intuitive use
One of the most important aspects of intranet platform implementation is that ROI follows adoption. If your intranet ROI is expected to flow from gains in efficiency and productivity, then your maximum gain requires widespread usage. The longer your intranet takes for employees to learn, the less likely it is that they’ll use it. So be sure to compare adoption rates across any platforms you consider.
Stay connected and aligned with a modern intranet
A modern intranet is the nerve center of your organization, driving productivity and efficiency.
Most importantly, make sure you’re signing up with an industry leader that’s known for smart, fast innovation — one that can keep up with the speed of technology and keep you ahead of the curve, both today and tomorrow.
Get a live demo and see what Simpplr’s intranet could accomplish for you.
Employee intranet software review snippets about Simpplr
“Future State’s highly distributed workforce requires effective communication across our team. Simpplr’s easy-to-use and visual digital workplace platform has enabled us to significantly increase our communications efficiency and empower our employees to connect with each other.” ~ Kathy Krumpe, COO, Future State
“When testing the platform, we found a 50% increase in efficiency when individuals searched for onboarding materials. Such time savings can quickly add up across our entire team and, I believe, will make the difference between just surviving, or thriving during challenging times.” ~ Wendy M. Pfeifer, CIO, Nutanix
“The Simpplr solution enabled Bay Federal Credit Union to create an intranet that engages, empowers, and improves the employee experience. By having an intranet that offers robust search capabilities, a user-friendly interface, and the ability to keep content fresh and engaging, we give our team members the tools and resources they need to work more effectively and efficiently.” Carrie L. Birkhofer, President and CEO, Bay Federal Credit Union
Employee intranet software FAQs
Employee intranet software FAQs for enterprise companies
Why do you need an enterprise intranet?
When evaluating intranets for enterprise use, it’s important to consider various factors. The needs of enterprises can vary, but here are important considerations:
- User experience: How intuitive is the user interface? Is it flexible to meet the specific needs of different departments, teams, and employee segments?
- Collaboration and communication: Does the intranet facilitate seamless collaboration among team members? What communications tools are integrated? Can users share documents and projects within the intranet?
- Integrations with existing systems: How well does the intranet integrate with existing enterprise applications (e.g., HR software, CRM, IT, knowledge management)
- Content management: How easy is it to create, edit, manage, and update content on the intranet? Is there automation to streamline processes?
- Security and compliance: What security measures are in place to protect sensitive data and ensure user privacy? Are there audit trails and access controls to monitor and manage user permissions?
- Scalability and performance: Can the intranet scale to accommodate organizational changes? What is the performance track record?
- Analytics and reporting: Does the intranet provide analytics and reporting features to track user engagement and content effectiveness? What insights can it provide to analyze the employee experience?
- Training and support: What training resources and documentation are provided?
- Cost and ROI: What is the total cost of ownership? How quickly can my organization expect to see a return?
- User adoption: Have other organizations of similar size and industry successfully adopted the solution? What is recent user feedback from current users?
- Future roadmap and innovation: What does the roadmap look like for future updates and improvements? How often are vendor release updates and what is the process for implementation?
Read our Intranet Buyer Guide for a roadmap to help guide you through the intranet buying process.
Should we build an intranet or buy an out-of-the-box solution?
Building means building from scratch an IT-configured solution for your enterprise needs and maintaining it through internal resources. This takes time and resources. On the other hand, an out-of-the-box intranet solution like Simpplr is designed to require minimal IT involvement. This means quick implementation and easy administration by your Internal Comms team. Explore the full benefits and drawbacks of buying vs building an intranet.
Employee intranet software FAQs for IT professionals
This section answers commonly asked questions about employee intranet software by IT. It covers a broad range of topics from installation and operation to troubleshooting and productivity enhancement tips, offering valuable information for industry professionals.
Is Simpplr’s intranet SOC 2 and SOC 3 compliant?
Yes and yes! Learn more about Simpplr’s security compliance.
How much lift from IT is needed to implement and manage Simpplr’s intranet?
Minimal. Simpplr research has found that delayed deployments are a top reason that intranets fail. Thus, Simpplr was developed to be easy and fast to deploy and requires no IT management after deployment. Ask these questions when considering new intranet software:
- How well does the intranet integrate with existing enterprise applications (e.g., HR software, CRM, IT, knowledge management)?
- Scalability and performance: Can the intranet scale to accommodate organizational changes? What is the performance track record?
- Analytics and reporting: Does the intranet provide analytics and reporting features to track user engagement and content effectiveness? What insights can it provide to analyze the employee experience?
- Training and support: What training resources and documentation are provided?
- User adoption: Have other organizations of similar size and industry successfully adopted the solution? What is recent user feedback from current users?
Solutions other than an intranet to consider, for small businesses
Choosing the right solution depends on the specific needs of your business. There are several alternatives to a complete intranet solution that smaller businesses might want to consider. These include collaboration tools and internal communications tools
