Microsoft Dynamics NAV (formerly Navision) and Microsoft Dynamics GP (formerly Great Plains Software) have a lot in common. At their core, they are both comprehensive ERP solutions that have an array of powerful tools to enable you to manage your business’ finances, operations, human resources, projects, supply chain, and manufacturing processes. Both are Microsoft products, which mean that they work seamlessly with other Microsoft solutions and systems. It also means that they have a familiar, intuitive user interface that enables users to adopt it and learn it quickly.
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But when you are trying to make a decision about which ERP solution is the best fit for your business, you need to understand the differences, not the similarities between products.
GP vs. NAV Comparison Chart
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Companies that choose Dynamics GP:
| Companies that choose Dynamics NAV:
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Both Dynamics GP and Dynamics NAV can be deployed on servers in a traditional on-premises environment, hosted by a partner, leased and deployed in a private cloud, or via Microsoft Azure. Learn more.
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GP vs. NAV Chart
| GP | NAV | |
| Accounting/Financial Management | Comprehensive financial management functionality to meet your unique business needs with improved controls and security. | Complete financial management functionality with a more flexible chart of accounts offering the ability to track financial transactions via account dimensions, resulting in fewer GL accounts. |
| Reporting | Leveraging Management Reporter, you can easily configure and run consolidated financial reports. | Through the use of up to 10 dimensions, NAV provides a flexible reporting structure to deliver results in any way your business needs. |
| Sales Order Processing | Includes out-of-the-box functions that enable sales order processing automation with customizable word templates that can be emailed to customers and the ability to capture line item billing information for non-inventory items. | Invoice for inventory and non-inventory items while taking advantage of a flexible report creation tool that helps create invoices that are unique based on company or customer requirements. |
| Payroll | Payroll functionality is an “out-of-the-box” feature | Payroll functionality is available through an integrated third-party solution |
| Procurement | Equipped with materials requirements planning functionality, GP makes possible smart procurement decisions and precise procurement adjustment according to specific requirements. GP also includes requisition management capabilities | Comprehensive procurement functionality provides real-time access to order status, product specification, production plans, inventory, requisition management and purchase order authorization. |
| Manufacturing | GP’s manufacturing suite includes sales forecasting, job costing, quality assurance, engineering change management and capacity requirement planning | NAV can improve production performance from your shop floor to bottom line by controlling different manufacturing areas ranging from order entry to delivery leveraging tools specifically for production orders and BOM, supply and capacity planning, agile manufacturing, version management, demand forecasting, machine centers, finite loading, and production scheduling. |
| Inventory Management | Controls inventory effectively by managing it on a site-by-site basis, reduces handling and increases accuracy for single and multisite warehouse operations, and ensures the right inventory is available at the right time to meet customer needs. | Track inventory items with multiple characteristics in order to reduce the number of inventory items in the system. |
| Project Management | Equipped with time sheet, expense report, resource control and accurate billing functionality, this ERP solution can help you control project direction, cost and execution | With support for budgeting and resource management, Dynamics NAV enables you to plan and manage projects by tracking expenses, predicting availability and planning capacity |
| Additional Functionality | Additional, specialized functionality is available through a vast network of certified third-party ISV solution providers that integrate seamlessly with GP | NAV’s source code is available for developers. NAV also has a large network of certified third-party ISV solution providers that work within the software itself. |
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on April 2014 but has been updated for freshness and comprehensiveness.