Revisiting M365 eDiscovery Without Premium Features
I was curious about what that old e3 licensing experience was like in 2026, so I took a look.
I was recently working on an outline for an upcoming presentation I’m going to be doing, and realized that I hadn’t created a case in eDiscovery without checking the checkbox for using Premium features in a very long time.
There was a time when, if I had a question about what you could do with an e3 license versus an e5, I would go look in Standard eDiscovery, but that’s been gone a long time, so instead I created a new case and unchecked the box to block myself from using Premium features.
I quickly created a new search and let it show me the statistics, which don’t change at all when this checkbox is disabled.
Naturally, the button to add the results to a review set was grayed out. I expected that. Review Sets have always been a Premium feature.
I hadn’t looked at the options available on the Export, though, and that’s where you really notice the difference.
First, you have fewer options for collecting versions from SharePoint and OneDrive. It’s either the current version or all versions.
Again, that makes sense.
You also have far fewer options for conversations and linked documents.
No list attachments.
No collecting the conversation
No HTML transcripts
No cloud attachments.
This may seem a bit painful, but it also makes sense. All of these tools process the data when it is added to the review set. Without a review set, processing of those links and related data doesn’t occur.
It can also mean things are quite difficult for an eDiscovery professional.
