RISE with SAP vs. GROW with SAP (SAP GROW): The Difference and How to Decide

RISE with SAP and GROW with SAP are the two commercial offerings SAP uses to sell cloud ERP, and the difference starts with where the customer is coming from. RISE with SAP is the journey for a company that already runs SAP ERP and needs to move it to the cloud: as SAP presents it in October 2026, the destination is SAP Cloud ERP Private, whose technical product name is SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition. GROW with SAP, which SAP's website now calls SAP GROW, is the entry point for a company starting a new ERP in the public cloud: the destination is SAP Cloud ERP, whose technical product name is SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition.

Upgrade frequency, extensibility, the fate of custom code, and the way users are counted all follow from the ERP edition inside the offering, not from the commercial name. The choice is explained by edition and starting point, not by company size.

What is RISE with SAP and which ERP does it deliver?

RISE with SAP is the subscription-based transformation offering SAP launched on January 27, 2021, to move customers' ERP to the cloud, with software, infrastructure, and technical operations contracted from SAP. In October 2026, SAP's page describes the RISE with SAP journey as the path to SAP Cloud ERP Private, supported by the RISE with SAP Methodology: a standardized project framework, guidance from SAP experts, and a transformation toolchain.

SAP Cloud ERP Private is the commercial name of the target ERP. SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition is the technical product name, which remains in guides and contracts. In SAP's official offering comparison, it has a functional scope comparable to on-premise SAP S/4HANA, full access to Customizing, and all extensibility options. The full map of names is in What is SAP S/4HANA. What the contract includes and how responsibilities are split with SAP are covered in RISE with SAP.

What is GROW with SAP and why does the website say SAP GROW?

GROW with SAP is the offering SAP launched on March 21, 2023, for adopting public cloud ERP, with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition at the core, accelerated adoption services, an expert community, and free learning resources. In October 2026, SAP's website presents the same offering as SAP GROW and defines it as SAP's entry point to cloud ERP, built on SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition and designed for companies new to SAP.

Both names are in use. The contract document for the public edition, version v7-2026, updated July 20, 2026, still carries GROW with SAP in its title and offerings, and the SAP Learning courses still use GROW with SAP in October 2026. SAP has given no single date for the change, so the practical rule is to keep, in a contract or a proposal, the name the document itself uses.

RISE with SAP and GROW with SAP side by side

The table compares the two offerings on the criteria that change a project, with data as of October 2026. Implementation, scope, extensibility, and upgrades come from the official offering comparison on SAP Help Portal; the user metric and tools come from the courses, announcements, and contract documents listed in the references.

Criterion	RISE with SAP	GROW with SAP (SAP GROW)
Target ERP, commercial name	SAP Cloud ERP Private	SAP Cloud ERP
Target ERP, technical name	SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition, a system dedicated to one customer (single tenant)	SAP S/4HANA Cloud Public Edition, a service shared among customers (multi-tenant)
Starting point	Existing SAP customer migrating from an on-premise environment	Company new to SAP, or a business unit starting an ERP from scratch
Implementation	New implementation, system conversion, selective data transition, or lift and shift	New implementation, with data migration
Scope and configuration	Comparable to on-premise SAP S/4HANA, with full access to Customizing	Standardized, preconfigured processes, set up through SAP Central Business Configuration
Extensibility	All options. ABAP Cloud is recommended, Standard ABAP is available, and modifications are possible but not recommended	In-app extensibility, ABAP Cloud, and side-by-side extensions on SAP BTP. Standard ABAP is not available
Upgrades	One release every two years, installed by SAP at the customer's request. The customer must plan the upgrade in time to stay in maintenance	Two upgrades per year, in February and August, applied by SAP on the schedule it publishes
User metric	FUE (full use equivalent), a unit that converts user types into a single number. The ratio is the one in the document attached to the order form	Per user, per month. The v7-2026 contract document keeps FUE in the offerings named GROW
Tools named by SAP	RISE with SAP Methodology. SAP LeanIX, SAP Signavio, and SAP Build in the package announced on April 22, 2025. SAP BTP in the subscription	SAP Activate, Digital Discovery Assessment, and SAP GROW Fast, an implementation service with a predefined scope

SAP Learning states that both packages include SAP Cloud ALM and SAP Build Process Automation. These lists come from announcements and training material: what each customer receives is what the order form and the contract documents in force at signing say.

Why "RISE for large enterprises, GROW for small companies" is not a technical rule

The link to company size comes from the launch: in 2023, SAP introduced GROW with SAP as an offering for midsize companies. The criterion SAP publishes today is different. The SAP GROW page, in October 2026, describes a cloud ERP built for companies of any size and says the offering is designed for companies new to SAP. The same page says RISE with SAP is aimed at existing SAP customers migrating from on-premise SAP environments as part of a broader business transformation.

Three situations documented by SAP contradict the size rule:

• Subsidiaries: SAP Learning positions GROW with SAP for midsize companies or subsidiaries requiring rapid adoption, and RISE with SAP for organizations that want to preserve specific processes while modernizing the core.
• Two-tier ERP: headquarters runs one ERP, and subsidiaries or divisions run another, integrated with the first. SAP's page on the topic ties the RISE with SAP journey, with SAP Cloud ERP Private, to the tier 1 ERP at headquarters, and SAP Cloud ERP to subsidiaries and divisions. The same corporate group can subscribe to both editions.
• Landscape complexity: SAP's course on RISE recommends a public cloud deployment for a customer with low landscape complexity and readiness for a new implementation, and a private cloud deployment for highly complex, fragmented, or heavily customized systems.

Size is a proxy for complexity, and the technical decision is about complexity: a new business unit whose processes fit the standard is a candidate for the public edition, and an operation that depends on custom code in maintenance, quality, and costing does not fit it without a redesign.

Did RISE with SAP ever include the public edition?

Yes, and the relationship still shows up on SAP pages. That is why the statement "RISE is private, GROW is public" needs a date. The table lists what SAP published on each date.

Date	What SAP published
January 27, 2021	Launch of RISE with SAP. The announcement names SAP S/4HANA Cloud as the ERP, without separating public and private editions
March 21, 2023	Launch of GROW with SAP, with the public edition at the core
April 22, 2025	Announcement of the SAP Cloud ERP Private package, built on RISE with SAP, with SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition as the ERP
August 4, 2025	The update on the ECC transition option names SAP Cloud ERP and SAP Cloud ERP Private as the end destinations of the RISE with SAP journey
October 2026	The RISE with SAP page describes the journey as the path to SAP Cloud ERP Private. The SAP GROW page says RISE with SAP can have SAP Cloud ERP or SAP Cloud ERP Private at the core

ASUG research published on October 6, 2026, based on 194 members, still reports respondents on RISE with SAP public edition (9%) next to RISE with SAP private edition (42%) and GROW with SAP (9%). ASUG does not state the denominator for those shares, so they describe the sample and not the U.S. market. Whether RISE with the public edition is available for a new purchase is a question for SAP, answered in writing.

How to decide between RISE with SAP and SAP GROW

Five questions settle the decision, in the order in which they rule out options. The criteria come from SAP's offering comparison, in its October 2026 version.

Question	What points to RISE	What points to SAP GROW
Is there a production SAP ERP whose history, configuration, and code must be preserved?	Yes. System conversion and selective data transition exist only for the Private Edition	No. The public edition is always a new implementation, with data migration
Do the processes fit the standard scope of the public edition in the current release?	Some industry processes fall outside the public scope	Every critical process has an active scope item
Can the extensions be rebuilt using released APIs only?	Some code depends on Standard ABAP or on unreleased objects	The extensions fit key user tools, ABAP Cloud, or SAP BTP
Can operations absorb two upgrades a year on dates set by SAP?	Regression testing needs a window chosen by the customer	The team tests integrations and processes in every February and August window
Are the add-ons in use qualified for the edition?	They depend on an add-on qualified for SAP S/4HANA	They exist as add-ons qualified for the Public Edition

The conditions for each transition path are in SAP S/4HANA migration: greenfield and brownfield, and the rules for extensions are in SAP clean core.

What each path changes for plant maintenance and integrations

For plant maintenance, the offering decides the edition, and the edition decides the process, the field app, and the interface. The detail by scope item and release is in SAP Cloud ERP public vs. private. In short:

• RISE with SAP on the Private Edition: maintenance keeps the classic SAP PM processes and gains the phase-based processes, configured through the IMG. SAP's mobile app for this back end is SAP Service and Asset Manager. The interfaces for work orders, notifications, confirmations, and measurement readings go into the project inventory and into the test plan for every upgrade.
• SAP GROW on the Public Edition: maintenance runs on scope items 4HH, 4HI, 4VT, 4WM, and 7Z4. For release 2602, SAP's course states there was no scope item for Refurbishment of Spare Parts or for the Checklist Process. SAP's mobile app is SAP Maintenance Assistant, and integrations use released interfaces only.

PM RUN is the maintenance execution, mobility, and planning platform that runs on top of SAP PM without replacing SAP, and it uses SAP PM on ECC 6.0 or on S/4HANA, on-premise or in the cloud. In a decision between RISE and GROW, the integration of any execution platform goes into the interface inventory of the chosen edition, and checking what was posted to SAP stays with the customer's team, as described in SAP PM integration log. The page on asset management in SAP describes what the platform executes.