Intranet Requirements: Checklist and RFP Guide (2026)

Start with one number. According to Gartner (May 2023), 47% of digital workers struggle to find the information they need to do their jobs. Add the fragmented day described by Microsoft, with an interruption every two minutes on average (Work Trend Index, 2025), and you have the real subject of your project. You don't pick an intranet for its feature list. You pick it for the time it gives back to your people. Your requirements should say so in black and white.

What are intranet requirements?

Intranet requirements are the reference document of the project. They describe the need (why, for whom, to do what), the constraints (technical, legal, financial) and the rules of the selection process. They serve three times: to align your teams internally, to get comparable answers from vendors, then to check at delivery that the promise was kept.

Two levels usually coexist:

• Functional requirements describe what users must be able to do: publish targeted news, find a procedure, reach an expert, read a policy on mobile.
• Technical requirements describe the frame: identity directory, data hosting, security, integrations, accessibility, reversibility.

When you send them to several vendors, they become the core of your intranet RFP (request for proposal), with the selection rules and timeline added on top.

What they are not: a list of 200 features copied from a competitor. That list feels reassuring, but it says nothing about your priorities. Every vendor will tick "yes" everywhere and you will have learned nothing. For an overview of what an intranet can do, start with our guide to the company intranet, then keep only what serves your people.

The 5-step approach, before you write a line

Solid requirements take preparation. Give yourself two to three weeks to set the frame: it structures both your internal thinking and your vendor consultation.

1. Diagnosis: what is not working today? What frustrates users says more than any wish list. Write down the three most frequent complaints, the real usage rate and the parallel tools (WhatsApp groups, shared folders, email lists). You will often find the reasons why intranets fail to engage employees.
2. Vision and objectives: where do you want to be in two years? Set 3 to 5 target indicators right now. "Improve internal communication" is not an objective. "70% monthly active visitors after 6 months" is.
3. Audiences and use: who will actually use the tool, from which device, in which language? This is where the role of mobile and multilingualism is decided.
4. Prioritizing needs. Rank every feature as must-have, should-have or optional (the MoSCoW method). Requirements where everything is a must-have help neither you nor the vendor.
5. Vendor selection criteria. Beyond features: integration with your Microsoft 365 environment, security, support, longevity and total cost.

The 2026 reflex fits in one sentence: start from use, not from the feature. The right question is not "do we want AI search?" but "how much time do our employees lose looking for information, and who is affected?". Describe the problem. The feature follows from it, and you will be able to measure whether it actually solved anything.

Your intranet requirements checklist: 3 parts

This is the structure of our template. It has three parts, and each section ends with the questions you need to settle.

Part 1. The company and its context

• The current intranet: its structure, its features and above all its real limits (dated ergonomics, slowness, search that finds nothing). Give the adoption rate, even a rough one: a rich intranet nobody opens is a failure.
• The need, objectives and success indicators, with a baseline and a target.
• The audiences, split into three groups: office employees with a workstation and a Microsoft 365 account; frontline teams (factory, store, healthcare, logistics), often without a fixed workstation and reachable mainly on mobile; and the contributors and administrators who will keep the platform alive.
• The intranet structure: levels (group, entities, sites), spaces, languages.

Part 2. Functional needs

1. Communication and social: targeted home pages, news, events, comments.
2. Content publishing: ready-to-use components, AI-assisted writing, internal newsletters.
3. User experience: mobile, access without a Microsoft 365 license, branding, accessibility, multilingualism.
4. Collaboration and knowledge management: documents, wikis, FAQs, AI-assisted access to knowledge.
5. Search and navigation: multi-level menus, unified search, people directory and skills.
6. Generative AI: assistant, business agents, AI governance.
7. Security, compliance and sovereignty: hosting, Entra ID, existing permissions, GDPR, Purview.
8. Measurement, adoption and engagement: active users, penetration by population, frontline included.
9. Integration with the Microsoft 365 ecosystem: Teams, SharePoint, Outlook, Viva, Copilot.

To make sure nothing is missing here, use our list of the must-have intranet features.

Part 3. Project support

• Approach and governance: agile or V-model, steering and project committees.
• Schedule and content migration: milestones, go-live date, content to carry over.
• Change management and adoption: launch plan, ambassador network, frontline support.
• Training: contributors, administrators, expected materials.
• Maintenance, support and SLA: updates, response times, support language.

Finally, add the rules of the consultation: expected answer format, timeline, scoring criteria.

5 requirements older templates miss

Most templates online predate Copilot and the European Accessibility Act. Our template flags these topics with a "2026" marker: they are the ones that make the difference today.

Frontline access, even without a Microsoft 365 license. Many factory workers, care staff and field agents have no named Microsoft 365 account. If the mobile app requires a license, the very people you target first are simply locked out. Require authentication and hosting designed for these users, so they can reach news, documents and HR information. Our comparison of mobile vs traditional intranets details the criteria.

Governed AI, and a license question to ask in writing. According to Gartner (February 2025), through 2026 organizations will abandon 60% of AI projects unsupported by AI-ready data. An assistant is only as good as the content it reads: a well-structured intranet is the foundation of AI agents, not their rival. Put three requirements in writing. The AI shows each person only what they are allowed to see. Your content is never used to train third-party models. And you know whether AI agents require a Microsoft 365 Copilot license per user, or can run without one. That last point changes the economics of a large-scale rollout. To go further, read our article on the intranet chatbot.

Data sovereignty. Favor a solution where your data stays in your Microsoft 365 tenant, with no copy on the vendor's side. Check the hosting region and reversibility. This chapter mobilizes IT and the CISO, and they are often the ones who sign: treat it as a part of its own, with our intranet security best practices.

Accessibility. The European Accessibility Act has applied to many digital products and services since June 28, 2025. Even if your intranet is not directly in scope, require WCAG 2.1 conformance. Together with mobile and languages, accessibility decides who can actually use the intranet.

Content migration. Migrating everything is rarely worth it. Use the project to sort, archive and carry over only what is useful. It is an information-hygiene exercise, and the condition for search and AI to return the right answer.

The grid to compare vendors

A great demo impresses. A weighted grid decides. Set the weights before you receive answers, and have each criterion scored by at least two people.

For the cost side, our guide to intranet cost lists the hidden items to include. To build your shortlist, start from our comparison of the best intranet software.

Running your intranet RFP in 8 to 10 weeks

A clear timeline gets better answers. Here is a realistic schedule.

• Week 1: send the requirements to 4 to 6 shortlisted vendors.
• Weeks 2 and 3: written Q&A, shared with all bidders to keep things fair.
• Week 5: answers received and first scoring on the grid.
• Weeks 6 and 7: demos on set scenarios (your journeys, your content), not generic sales demos.
• Week 8: a few days of testing in your own environment for the two finalists.
• Weeks 9 and 10: negotiation, reference calls, decision.

The set scenario is the best filter. Give every vendor the same three tasks (publish targeted news for one site, find an HR procedure from a phone, onboard a new hire) and compare.

6 mistakes that sink intranet requirements

• Copying a competitor's feature list. You inherit their priorities, not yours.
• Forgetting frontline teams. They are often half your workforce, and the hardest to reach.
• Underestimating contribution. An intranet lives on its contributors. If publishing takes 20 minutes, nobody will publish.
• Budgeting only for the license. Rollout, training and community management weigh just as much over three years.
• Ignoring content migration. Moving 5,000 outdated pages is moving the attic without sorting it.
• Choosing on the demo. The demo shows the best case. A test on your content shows yours.

Starting from an existing intranet? Our intranet redesign method completes this guide, step by step.

Start your project with a proven template

Good intranet requirements come down to one idea: describe use cases and outcomes, not a catalog. Follow the 5 steps, cover the 3 parts, prioritize every need, add the 2026 requirements and decide with a grid. You will get comparable answers and a tool your people will actually open.

To save time, download our free intranet specification template, 2026 edition. It combines a guide that explains every need, with the questions to ask yourself, and tables to complete and prioritize before you send them to vendors. The Jinters built it from their Microsoft 365 projects. Want to see an intranet that ticks these boxes without custom development? Discover Jint SharePoint.