The best voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) apps are compatible with a range of devices, from desktops and laptops to smartphones. They feature an intuitive interface that accommodates non-tech-savvy team members. Aside from ease of access and use, they allow businesses to maximize robust call management tools, including auto-attendants, call forwarding, and visual voicemail.
Moreover, they offer capabilities supporting mobility, enabling on-the-go professionals to place and accept calls wherever they are. These mobility features include call flip, visual voicemail, and hot desking. In this article, we compared the best VoIP apps and outlined their best use cases:
- RingCentral: Best for streamlined call management
- Nextiva: Best for long-distance calls
- Vonage: Best for customized phone system
- Dialpad: Best for artificial intelligence (AI)
- Grasshopper: Best for solopreneur communications
- Ooma: Best for international calling
- Phone.com: Best for fluctuating call volumes
Best VoIP Apps Compared
Providers | Monthly Starting Price (per User) | Key Features | FSB Rating |
---|---|---|---|
| 4.60 out of 5 | ||
| 4.56 out of 5 | ||
$19.99 |
| 4.47 out of 5 | |
| 4.41 out of 5 | ||
| 4.33 out of 5 | ||
$9.99 for Ooma Home; $19.95 for Ooma Office |
| 4.30 out of 5 | |
| 4.25 out of 5 | ||
RingCentral: Best for Unified Communications
What We Liked
- Offers 99.999% uptime guarantee in all subscription plans
- Integrates with over 300 business apps
- Large audio and video conferencing capacity
Where It Falls Behind
- More expensive than other VoIP providers
- Only offers a maximum of 200 messaging service (SMS) credits per user
- Limited toll-free minute allowance in the entry-level plan
RingCentral Monthly Pricing*
- Core: $30 per user for unlimited domestic calling, visual voicemail, shared lines, incoming caller ID, and mobile apps for iOS and Android
- Advanced: $35 per user for hot desking, unlimited internet fax, call monitoring, and integrations with customer relationship management (CRM) apps
- Ultimate: $45 per user for unlimited storage for files, messaging, and recordings, Business Analytics Pro, and device analytics and alerts
- Free trial: 14 days
*Save up to 33% by paying annually. Volume discounts for 50-plus users are available.
RingCentral is the best VoIP app for companies aiming to keep key communication channels in one place. It offers tools for managing phone calls, text messages, team chats, and video meetings, eliminating the need for separate communication platforms and the likelihood of data silos.
The VoIP phone system handles large volumes of calls, thanks to the robust call management tools, which include the interactive voice response (IVR) system, call forwarding, extensions, and call delegation. Professionals who frequently travel are able to stay connected through hot desking and shared lines. As for team collaboration tools, RingCentral supports file sharing and task management in instant messaging and artificial intelligence (AI) insights in video meetings.
Unfortunately, RingCentral only allows a maximum of 200 text credits per user a month. Other VoIP apps like Vonage enable users to send unlimited SMS to colleagues and customers.
RingCentral Features
- Presence: See who among your colleagues is available for a phone call or a meeting. Team members’ user presence may be set to available, busy, or do not disturb modes.
- Hot desking: Allow team members to log into any phone in your system and access their unique extensions, profiles, or voicemail inboxes. With this, anyone can work anywhere in the office and freely collaborate with other departments without missing important calls.
- Call delegation: Assign assistants to answer incoming calls for executives. RingCentral allows a maximum of 10 assistants to an executive and 10 executives to an assistant.
Nextiva: Best for Long-distance Calls
What We Liked
- Supports Bring Your Own Device (BYOD)
- Unlimited internet fax is available in all plans
- Number porting is free of charge
Where It Falls Behind
- Users must upgrade to the most expensive plan to use voicemail transcription
- Doesn't offer unlimited texting
- Third-party integrations are limited to 20-plus apps
Nextiva Monthly Pricing*
- Essential: $30.95 per user for unlimited voice and video calling, threaded conversations, voicemail-to-email notifications, and call group
- Professional: $35.95 per user for voicemail to SMS notifications, unlimited conference calls for up to 40 participants, and integrations with CRM apps
- Enterprise: $45.95 per user for unlimited conference calls for unlimited participants, voicemail transcription, and single sign-on
*Pay $23.95, $27.95, and $37.95 for the tiered subscriptions when you choose annual billing. Volume discounts are available for more than four users.
Nextiva is our top-recommended VoIP app for growing businesses receiving calls from a national client base, as it offers a toll-free minute allowance in its subscription plans. The most expensive plan has 12,500 minutes, which can accommodate high-volume calls of non-technical customer queries.
The best part about Nextiva is its built-in ticket management feature, which allows you to assign requests to team members and makes resolving concerns more efficient. While Nextiva is the ideal VoIP phone app for long-distance calls, it keeps its voicemail transcription—a key phone feature—in its most expensive plan. If you don’t want to pay more for this tool, go for Grasshopper, which offers transcription in its base-level plan costing $17 per user, monthly.
Nextiva Features
- Call pop: Refer to key customer details while on a live call. Call pop displays customer sentiment from the caller’s last interaction with your business, last survey response, experience score, and the value of their account.
- Call pulling: If you’re in an ongoing call and need to step away from your desk, use call pulling to move a call from your desktop phone to your mobile. With this, you don’t need to cut the conversation short and interrupt the flow of the discussion.
- Threaded conversations: View past calls, voicemail messages, chats, and texts in one place. This eliminates the need to switch between menu tabs to find messages.
Vonage: Best for Customized Call Flows
What We Liked
- Offers unlimited SMS and multimedia message service (MMS)
- Large meeting participant capacity
- Provides a service level agreement (SLA) of 99.999% uptime
Where It Falls Behind
- New accounts are locked to a one-year minimum contract
- Add-ons quickly inflate monthly fees
- Third-party integrations are limited to 20 platforms
Vonage Monthly Pricing*
- Mobile: $19.99 per user for unlimited domestic calling, unlimited SMS and MMS, and desktop and mobile app support
- Premium: $29.99 per user for a virtual receptionist, analytics and reporting, unlimited video meetings for up to 200 participants, and third-party integrations
- Advanced: $39.99 per user for call group, on-demand call recording, voicemail transcription, and single sign-on (SSO)
*Volume discounts are available for more than four users.
Vonage is the best VoIP app for businesses looking to customize call flows and personalize customer interactions. It features smart numbers, a tool that uses various application programming interfaces (APIs) to perform different functions programmatically. You may program the system to send the agent’s schedule availability, broadcast a voice alert, prompt a two-factor authentication, or send a text when a customer reaches your number.
Aside from customizing call flows, Vonage lets businesses modify the actual phone system depending on their needs. It offers more than 40 default unified communications (UC) features and a separate menu of add-on tools to manage calls more efficiently. Unfortunately, some of these add-ons are expensive. For instance, call queues cost $250 per queue, monthly, for unlimited use.
Consider the other best VoIP apps listed here if you consistently receive large volumes of calls. Call queues are readily available in RingCentral’s entry-level plan costing $30 per user, monthly. Meanwhile, Dialpad’s hold queues are in its second-tier plan priced at $35 per user, per month.
Vonage Features
- Virtual receptionist: Let an auto-attendant answer incoming calls and distribute them to appropriate departments or team members. Configure the phone menu in a way that reflects common customer concerns.
- Caller ID block: Keep your business name and phone number private when placing calls. Call recipients will see “Unavailable” or “Blocked” when they see the incoming call alert.
- Call tagging: Add labels to calls to quickly organize customer conversations later. This is especially useful for marketing campaigns, as it helps you evaluate success by looking at the volume of calls representing interest in products or services.
Dialpad: Best for Artificial Intelligence
What We Liked
- Supports international SMS and calling
- Offers 100% uptime guarantee
- Almost all video conferencing features are offered in all subscription plans
Where It Falls Behind
- Uptime SLA is exclusively offered at the highest-tier plan
- Only allows 10 participants in a video meeting
- Internet fax requires a separate fee
Dialpad Monthly Pricing*
- Standard: $23 per user for custom call routing, call forwarding, three-way calling, call recording, and automatic spam call detection
- Pro: $35 per user for hold queues, international SMS, and integrations with CRM tools
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for a minimum of 100 seats, phone extensions, integrations with single sign-on solutions, and priority routing for customer support
- Free trial: 14 days
*Pay only $15 and $25 for the Standard and Pro plans, respectively, when you choose annual billing.
Dialpad is the best app for VoIP call center teams wanting to boost agent efficiency through artificial intelligence (AI). Through natural language processing, the Action Items feature automatically detects different types of action steps mentioned in calls and meetings, including contacting an individual, sharing information, or scheduling a meeting.
With this, service representatives don’t have to spend a significant amount of time going over phone calls and extracting the next action steps. They immediately get to doing the required to-do’s. When you upgrade to Dialpad’s contact center plans, Custom Moments helps you monitor specific topics during a call. When a predefined phrase is mentioned in a conversation, the system automatically files that under Custom Moments, making referring to that specific topic easier later.
While Dialpad is an excellent, AI-powered solution, it’s not the best meeting platform, as it only allows up to 10 participants in a session. It limits meetings to five hours. RingCentral is the ideal VoIP solution for companies wanting to host big groups of attendees and long discussions, as it supports 500 participants and a 24-hour duration.
Dialpad Features
- Customizable caller ID: Switch between different phone numbers to reflect your main company’s phone number or your specific department’s. With this, you’ll maintain professionalism in your communications and increase call connection rates, as recipients instantly know who’s calling them.
- Call park: If you want other team members to access a live call and take over customer concerns, place the caller on hold and put it in a communal parking spot. Park your most valuable clients in VIP parking spaces so team members can prioritize them when retrieving calls.
- Three-way calling: Customer service representatives have the option to add managers or seasoned agents to an existing call to quickly address a complex concern. Click the person with the plus sign icon on the call control buttons to begin a three-way call.
Grasshopper: Best for VoIP Beginners
What We Liked
- Unlimited phone extensions and business texting
- Offers different types of phone numbers: local, toll-free, vanity, and international
- Allows users to customize phone greetings
Where It Falls Behind
- Lacks call recording capabilities
- Doesn’t have video conferencing and team chat tools like other providers
- Requires an existing phone line
Grasshopper Monthly Pricing*
- True Solo: $17 for one user, one business phone number, and one extension
- Solo Plus: $34 for unlimited users and three extensions
- Partner: $56 for three business phone numbers and six extensions
- Small Business: $92 for five phone numbers and unlimited extensions
- Free trial: 7 days
*Save over 10% by paying annually. All subscription plans include all VoIP features, including call forwarding, simultaneous call handling, and virtual fax.
Grasshopper is the best VoIP app for small businesses new to cloud-based phone systems because it’s a lightweight platform. Its bare-bones features and simple interface are not intimidating for beginners and won’t require long hours of technical training. In fact, you may be familiar with the platform within a few minutes. Moreover, it’s easy to set up the VoIP system.
What’s better about Grasshopper is its affordability. While other VoIP providers charge per user, Grasshopper has a flat rate pricing for unlimited users starting in the Solo Plus plan. As you grow your company, you don’t need to pay more for extra seats for additional team members.
However, this VoIP provider may not be the best solution for your business if you’re looking for advanced call management tools that would help you manage large amounts of customer inquiries. It lacks a call flow editor, skills-based routing, call monitoring, and call recording. If you’re dealing with high call volumes, RingCentral is the better choice given its advanced VoIP tools.
Grasshopper Features
- Business hours: Set up a schedule for each extension based on your team’s operating hours. You only get calls when you want them or are available to take them.
- Toll-free numbers: Encourage your customers to call you using toll-free numbers so they won’t incur calling charges. Toll-free numbers present a professional image and allow you to be available to your nationwide clientele.
- Voice Studio: Grasshopper has a pool of professional voice actors who can record your custom phone greetings. Announcements can be recorded in English and Spanish.
Ooma: Best for Home-based Freelancers
What We Liked
- Affordable subscription rates
- Features 500 toll-free minutes in all Ooma Office plans
- Free number porting and the transfer process is simple
Where It Falls Behind
- Doesn't offer international phone numbers
- Ooma Office’s entry-level plan doesn't have call recording and voicemail transcription
- Users must upgrade to the highest-tier Ooma Office plan to access call queues
Ooma Monthly Pricing
Ooma Home Phone:
- Ooma Basic: Free for calls within the United States (U.S.), PureVoice HD technology, answering machine, and online call log (Telo device for a one-time fee of $99.99)
- Ooma Premier: $9.99 for free calling to Canada and Mexico, instant second line, and call forwarding
- World Plan: $17.99 for unlimited calling to landlines in over 60 countries and to mobile phones in over 10 countries
- World Plus Plan: $25.99 for unlimited calling to landlines in over 70 countries and to mobile phones in over 40 countries
Ooma Office:
- Essentials: $19.95 per user for call forwarding, virtual extensions, simultaneous ring, and virtual fax
- Pro: $24.95 per user for access to desktop app, call recording, voicemail transcription, dynamic caller ID, text messaging, and analytics
- Pro Plus: $29.95 per user for call queues, call screening, hot desking, third-party integrations with CRM tools, and find me-follow me
- Free trial: 30-day money-back guarantee
Ooma is the suitable VoIP software solution for home-based solopreneurs, as it provides a residential plan free of monthly charge. Purchase the VoIP phone adapter Telo for a one-time fee of $99.99 and you’ll access essential phone capabilities, such as domestic calling, high-definition voice, call logs, and answering machine, without the worry and hassle of monthly fees. Given this subscription plan offering, Ooma makes for the best free VoIP app.
As you grow your operations and require more advanced VoIP tools, upgrade to Ooma Office, which starts at an affordable price of $19.95 per user, monthly. The higher-tier subscription plans offer team chat and video conferencing on top of the call management features.
Unlike other VoIP providers, Ooma doesn’t offer international numbers. In contrast, RingCentral has local phone numbers in over 100 countries. Phone.com covers 50-plus countries and provides discounts for bulk purchases.
Ooma Features
- Simultaneous ring: Minimize customer wait times or missed calls by alerting multiple devices simultaneously. When an incoming call is received, all the devices—IP phones, mobile phones, and applications—connected to the extension will ring.
- Shared voicemail boxes: Users sharing extensions like ring groups have a dedicated voicemail box accessible to all team members. This allows team members to respond faster and refer to messages easily.
- Call blocking: Prevent telemarketers from reaching your business phone line. Ooma allows you to configure robocall blocking actions, with options to play a busy tone or send to voicemail.
Phone.com: Best for Fluctuating Call Volumes
What We Liked
- Almost all essential VoIP features are included in the entry-level plan
- Low rates for additional phone numbers
- Offers 24/7 support in all subscription packages
Where It Falls Behind
- Natively connects with four third-party apps only
- Extra charge for the use of call recording in the Basic and Pro plans
- Users must upgrade to the highest-tier plan to unlock call analytics
Phone.com Monthly Pricing*
- Basic: $14.99 per user for 500 pooled minutes, call transfer, call screening, follow me, dial-by-name directory, and audio conferencing
- Plus: $21.99 per user for unlimited minutes, voicemail transcription, up to 25 video meeting participants, livestreaming of video conferencing sessions, and breakout rooms
- Pro: $31.99 per user for call recording, call analytics, integration with CRM tools, and up to 100 video meeting participants
*Save 15% by paying annually. Volume discounts are available for more than four users.
Phone.com is the best VoIP solution for companies dealing with fluctuating call volumes, as it has metered and unlimited calling plans. The entry-level plan includes 500 pooled minutes, ideal for those times you have low call volumes. Each user on the account adds 500 minutes usable for both inbound and outbound calls. If you have five users in an account, those users have access to 2,500 minutes.
Meanwhile, Phone.com’s two higher-tier plans have unlimited minutes, which suit those times when you receive a huge volume of customer queries. But regardless of the subscription package you choose, you’ll have access to almost all the VoIP features Phone.com offers, including call forwarding, call waiting, call screening, and follow me.
Besides that, Phone.com is one of the best VoIP apps for international calls. Take advantage of the low per-minute rates and the local fees on calls to landline numbers in Canada, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Puerto Rico, and the United Kingdom.
However, note that when you choose this VoIP provider, you can only integrate it with four third-party apps. If you don’t want to use an integration platform like Zapier to link external solutions, go for a platform with robust prebuilt integrations like RingCentral, which connects to over 300 apps.
Phone.com Features
- Call handling: Set rules and protocols for routing incoming calls. Determine whether calls should be routed to a single or different destination depending on the time of day or caller.
- Voicemail transcription: The phone system automatically converts voicemail messages to readable text and sends the written version to your email or as a text message. Go through your messages without listening to the audio clips. Forward transcriptions to others for documentation.
- Greetings: Personalize your audio greetings, music, menus, and messages by uploading audio files. Phone.com supports different file formats, such as MP3, GSM, and WAV.
How We Evaluated the Best VoIP Apps
To objectively assess the best VoIP platforms, we created a rubric that includes criteria points reflecting small business priorities. Our considerations include accessible pricing points, call management features, user-friendliness, and customer assistance. We evaluated the providers’ popularity as well.
Learn how we evaluated the best VoIP apps by clicking on the tabs below.
20% of Overall Score
Affordability is a key consideration in our evaluation, so we looked at the rates of each provider’s entry-level and second-tier plans, comparing them to the usual fees in the market. Higher points were given to vendors offering discounts for annual billing and volume users.
30% of Overall Score
We checked if the VoIP solutions feature mobile apps and unlimited calling within the U.S. and Canada. Since businesses need a reliable platform, we took into account the uptime guarantee, giving more points to those with 99.999% availability. Video and audio conferencing were also part of our evaluation.
15% of Overall Score
We determined if the provider has a robust interactive voice response (IVR) system and supports international calling. Other factors we evaluated were vanity numbers and third-party integrations. We assigned more points to providers that connect with a wide range of business tools.
10% of Overall Score
Since not all team members are tech-savvy, we prioritized user-friendliness in VoIP apps, weighing if the platform requires technical expertise to set up and operate. We checked if it has an intuitive interface with little to no learning curve.
10% of Overall Score
Timely assistance is important for businesses using VoIP software solutions, thus we included the customer service hours of each provider in our evaluation. We favored those with various communication channels as well, particularly those offering phone, email, and live chat support.
15% of Overall Score
Our expert score includes our assessment of standout features and value for money. We determined each vendor’s popularity and ease of use by checking the ratings and feedback of business professionals on third-party review platforms.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
To find the most suitable solution for your communication needs, consider the following factors:
- Accessibility: The VoIP platform must be accessible on different devices and systems to ensure a smooth transition.
- Features: The software solution’s capabilities must match your communication requirements. If you receive multiple calls a day, consider a platform with advanced call management tools. If you frequently call customers overseas, go for one that offers low international calling rates.
- Integrations: A good VoIP solution connects with a wide range of third-party tools, reducing the hassle of app switching.
- Reliability: Check the uptime guarantee of your chosen provider. Five-nines availability is ideal to ensure uninterrupted service to clients.
Yes, you can use a traditional or landline phone for VoIP by plugging the device into an analog telephone adapter (ATA), which connects to the router. ATAs convert analog signals from the analog phone into data packets that are then sent through the VoIP network. This enables you to make and receive phone calls via the internet.
RingCentral is the best VoIP for iOS and Android devices, as it offers a wide range of call management features that make handling customer queries more efficient. Moreover, its smartphone app has an intuitive interface that makes navigation easy.
Bottom Line
VoIP software solutions support mobility, improve call management efficiency, and make scaling communications easier. Out of all the service providers we reviewed, RingCentral is the best VoIP solution because of its robust unified communications tools, which facilitate excellent customer and team engagement.
Through RingCentral’s business phone system, instant messaging, and video conferencing, businesses manage large volumes of calls and collaborate with team members easily. Moreover, its VoIP solution is compatible with different devices and operating systems, improving accessibility for different users. Sign up for RingCentral’s 14-day free trial today.