Sharepoint sites or OneNote for company wiki?

[u/Longjumping_Ratio243]

I want to create a wiki/knowledge base for our company, mainly for technical documentation. I'm not sure if I should use Sharepoint sites or OneNote notebooks for that.

Sharepoint sites seem to be better structured, easier to maintain, better for collaboration, better version control and has a way for approval process. Overall the better features in my opinion. But it also seems harder and less flexible to use than OneNote. I also think it's faster to edit something in OneNote than in a Sharepoint site. Some people in my company already use OneNote, so it seems easier to convince them to use OneNote.
My fear with Sharepoint sites is that it's to slow and rigid and therefore nobody will use it.

I'm asking myself if it's better to have a lively mess in OneNote or the possibility of a dead Sharepoint wiki?

Which tool would you recommend? Or using both? Any general recommendations regarding this topic are very welcome.

[u/BenchOrdinary9291]

If strictly wiki/ knowledge base, no future automation workload updates, etc. stay on OneNote, if the latter do Sharepoint. SP allows for permissions to be set on pages with more flexibility, plus PowerAutomate and PowerApps are easier on SharePoint. If your users are on OneNote the transition to Sharepoint will be a bit easier with the proper amount of training.

[u/Inevitable_Dog6292]

Honestly your framing at the end nails it: a lively mess beats a dead wiki every time. A knowledge base nobody contributes to is just a well-organised void.

That said, I’d push back slightly on the binary. SharePoint has gotten meaningfully faster to edit than it used to be, and the wiki-style page editing in modern SharePoint is genuinely close to OneNote now. The gap you’re describing was more real three years ago than it is today.

My actual take: start in OneNote, but structure it like you eventually want SharePoint to look. Sections map to topics, pages map to articles. Let people contribute messily and find the natural shape of your documentation. Once you hit the point where search is failing you, permissions matter, or you need approvals, that’s when you migrate the stuff worth keeping into SharePoint. By then you also know what your team actually documents versus what they intend to document.

The failure mode I’ve seen most often is the opposite approach: build a beautiful SharePoint taxonomy upfront, spend two weeks on governance, then watch nobody use it because contributing feels like filing paperwork.

One thing worth knowing: OneNote notebooks stored in SharePoint still benefit from SharePoint’s version history and permissions model, so you’re not completely giving up structure by starting there.

Go where your people already are. Friction kills wikis faster than anything else.

[u/CatOnMyKeyboardAgain]

I like OneNote, just not sure I'd trust it as the main company wiki... Fine for notes or if your team is very small, but with a bunch of people using it I can see it turning into a mess.

Is using something outside the Microsoft stack an option at all? If not, I'd go with Sharepoint. If yes, I'd also look at some dedicated wiki tools like Confluence or Nuclino. We use Nuclino for ours, it's pretty straightforward

[u/gzelfond]

Definitely SharePoint pages! OneNote is just a 1 file. It might be OK for a small project wiki, but if you envision a corporate Wiki, SharePoint pages win. Lots of ways to organize content + keep it fresh with Copilot, not to mention the opportunities with automations, reminders, scheduling, etc. I have a few examples on my portfolio site, like this one: https://lookbook365.com/knowledge-base-wiki/

[u/darxandra → u/gzelfond]

I agree here. OneNote is okay for storing information for a team, but not appropriate for an enterprise knowledge base. SharePoint has so many more powerful features you can use with it as well. Governance and managing out of date information to keep the knowledge base up to date can be done much easier in SPO vs OneNote. Be sure to train your users and provide information that will help them in their usage.

[u/Due-Boot-8540]

There’s always Loop but I’d say SharePoint is the best option. Once you’re using it, there are loads of ways to enhance it and maintain content.

[u/darxandra → u/Due-Boot-8540]

I thought about mentioning Loop but I have not found it to be easy to use or maintain. I have not researched how widespread adoption of Loop has been and would be more concerned about its future.

[u/Due-Boot-8540 → u/darxandra]

I’m not a big user of it, either but I’ve seen it used in this situation a few times. I don’t see it disappearing in the near future but I can der it being integrated into Copilot or something…

[u/Embarrassed-Town383]

The deciding factor is usually not the tool, it is whether anyone will keep writing: both of your options fail the same way a year in, when the wiki has drifted and the answer people trust is in a Teams thread from March. Of the two, a SharePoint site survives that drift better, because search reaches it and it can grow structure later, but it only earns the maintenance if the pages that matter are short and owned by a name.

Disclosure: I build ThreadWeave, so weigh that accordingly. It sidesteps the choice by capturing what the team already writes in Teams, Outlook and SharePoint and making that searchable on hardware you own, one way in and nothing back out. It is not a wiki replacement, and it will not fix an organisation that has decided not to document anything.

[u/Jane_OrangeLogic]

You can definitely try SharePoint for the actual company knowledge then OneNote for any personal/temporary notes. That could work since SP gives the clearer structure (plus permissions, search, version history, etc) but the bigger issue is adoption. So just keep the SP site simple. Both can still work as well. Everyone can still use OneNote for working notes then everything useful for company knowledge can move into SharePoint.