OneDirectory vs Sift

A current org chart and a correct org chart are not the same claim.

Any product that syncs from Entra ID can keep a chart up to date. Whether the chart is right, with every reporting line actually recorded, is a different question, and it is the one this comparison turns on.

We trialed Sift hands-on with a demonstration dataset of 1,000 users, so what follows comes from using the product, not from reading their website. This comparison is part of our full 12-tool review.

The short answer

Sift describes itself as organizational intelligence software. In practice it is an employee directory and org chart tool: employee profiles, people search across profile attributes, and a chart of reporting lines. Product as trialed and as described on justsift.com, August 2026.

OneDirectory is org chart software with an employee directory built in, made for mid-sized and large organizations. It renders formal reporting lines from Entra ID plus dotted-line and assist reporting, on the profile and on the chart, and it ships a Directory Console for correcting the data underneath. In G2’s Summer 2026 reports it ranks first for Mid-Market Usability, with badges for being fast to implement, easy to use, easy to do business with, and strong estimated ROI.

The overlap is real. Both do directory, search and org chart, and both find people by skill. The differences show up in how finding people feels day to day, who is allowed to change the structure, and what the bill does as you grow.

What we found when we trialed Sift

Sift's profiles are genuinely rich, with plenty of fields to extend, and the live org chart does exactly what it promises: working out who reports to whom takes seconds.

The friction showed up once we went past simple name lookup, because finding people relies on building filters, with a lot of click-downs to reach the information we wanted, and the same heaviness ran through setup, where managing fields and data meant hopping between settings screens that never felt intuitive. Capable tool, clunkier experience than its reputation for speed suggests.

That gap is the buying decision in miniature. OneDirectory search is type-and-go across name, team, office, role and skill, with org context in the results, and structure management lives in one Console rather than scattered settings.

When you would definitely choose OneDirectory

1. You are a mid-sized or large organization on Microsoft 365 and you want people search that works by typing, not by building filters. In our Sift trial, reaching a person past simple name lookup took repeated click-downs.
2. Your manager data is incomplete and someone has to fix it at scale. Across 65 customer tenants at first Microsoft 365 sync, 42% of employees had a manager recorded. The Directory Console exists for exactly that work.
3. You need dotted-line and assist reporting on the chart and the profile, maintained by Administrators and Directory Editors rather than edited by anyone.
4. You want the price to hold still while headcount grows. At 1,000 employees, Sift Complete on published rates is roughly $3,385 a month. OneDirectory Pro is $999.
5. You want every employee in the directory whether or not they ever log in, because OneDirectory bills by profile, not by login user.

Where Sift fits

Two situations, honestly held:

1. You are under roughly 60 people and everyone logs in. On published rates Sift is cheaper at that size.
2. You want profiles carrying languages, interests and project involvement out of the box. That breadth is Sift's design focus. OneDirectory covers skills and handles the rest through custom fields.

The data underneath the chart

Any org chart is only as good as the manager fields behind it, whichever product renders it. When we measured 65 customer tenants at their first Microsoft 365 sync in January 2026, 42% of employees had a manager recorded. Measured again in August, the same tenants stood at 79%.

That improvement took seven months of administrator work in the Directory Console and in Entra ID, and we cannot separate the software’s contribution from theirs. The cohort is also self-selected: every organization in it had already decided its directory needed fixing.

Full tables and method in The Employee Directory Data Problem Is Fixable and The State of Employee Directories in 2026.

Structure is admin-maintained

Employees keep their own profiles current. The structure itself, reporting line, dotted-line manager and assist reporting, is maintained by Administrators and Directory Editors, and shows on both the profile and the chart. End users cannot rewrite the chart they appear in, which is what keeps it usable as a source of truth.

What each product costs

Both companies publish figures. OneDirectory is banded by employee profile count:

Enterprise is quoted above 2,000 profiles. A multi-tenant directory is available at $199 a month per additional tenant, and Guided Deployment is a one-time $3,000 option.

Sift charges a base fee plus a rate per user who can log in, with a 20-user minimum and Enterprise quoted above 1,000 employees. Their published plans:

Put the two shapes side by side, using Sift Complete since it covers both org chart and directory, and assuming every employee logs in:

All figures from both companies’ published rates as of 17 August 2026, monthly on annual billing. Sift’s published rates stop at 1,000 employees; OneDirectory’s bands run to 2,000. The crossover sits around 60 to 70 people: below it Sift is cheaper, above it the gap widens with every hire, because a per-user rate keeps climbing and a band does not. Check the arithmetic yourself rather than taking ours.

What employees actually use

Across 16,267 active employees in 65 customer organizations, the 90 days to 14 August 2026 produced 514,602 search-result views in OneDirectory. Search is the daily habit. The chart is consulted when structure matters: reorganizations, onboarding, and the days somebody needs to know who owns a decision. Renewal in deployments above 500 active users has held above 80%.

Buy for the search your people will run every day and the chart your organization needs to be right.

“Our VP of IT decided on OneDirectory due to how easy it was to use, how well it looked, and the cost-effectiveness. The built-in organizational chart was a large plus.” - John-Micheal Warner, Help Desk Technician at B&D Industrial.

Multipli Credit Union Modernizes Org Charts with OneDirectory

How Multipli Credit Union moved from a manually maintained structure to an automatically maintained org chart.

The OneDirectory BlogGreg Bennett

Feature comparison

Sift observations come from our hands-on trial with a 1,000-user demonstration dataset and from justsift.com, both August 2026. Vendor products change, so check before you buy.

When to choose which

“We chose OneDirectory for the peace of mind knowing that when we input a new employee, the information automatically feeds into OneDirectory. This has saved hours of manual labor!” - Lydia Fox, Director of Training & Development.

What we cannot tell you

Our Sift trial ran on a 1,000-user demonstration dataset, not a production deployment. A trial shows the product; it does not show year two.

The cost table prices Sift with every employee as a login user. A different login share changes the numbers, so run your own headcount through both published rate cards.

And our before-and-after figures come from our own customers, who had already decided their directories needed work. That is evidence of what the fix looks like, not a controlled comparison against any other product.

Method and citation

Competitor observations come from a hands-on trial of Sift using a 1,000-user demonstration dataset, August 2026, and from justsift.com as published on 17 August 2026.

First-party data: 65 customer tenants measured at first Microsoft 365 sync (January 2026) and again in August 2026, and product analytics covering 16,267 employees across the same organizations over the 90 days to 14 August 2026, excluding guest accounts, service accounts, shared mailboxes and disabled accounts. The cohort is self-selected.

Cite these figures as the OneDirectory Workplace Directory Usage Report, August 2026: anonymized product analytics from 16,267 employees across 65 organizations, published under CC BY 4.0.

Start with OneDirectory

For a mid-sized or large organization where the structure has to be right and the price has to hold still, this is the tool.

Other comparisons

OneDirectory vs Pingboard: Directory vs Org Chart (2026)

Compare OneDirectory and Workleap Pingboard on org chart software, directory scope and enterprise rollout.

The OneDirectory BlogGreg Bennett

OneDirectory vs Employee Directory 365

Compare OneDirectory and Employee Directory 365 on published pricing, org chart software and editing permissions.

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Background reading: What is an organizational chart? The complete guide.