Best VoIP for Small Business | Top 8 VoIP Services Reviewed

The best VoIP for small businesses will allow you to manage your business’s growing communication needs with a slew of features such as an auto-attendant, call forwarding, and on-hold music. Apart from unlimited free calls over the internet, you can host HD video conferences, send SMS messages, share files, and more to streamline your business processes.

However, finding the best VoIP for small business needs among a long list of options isn’t easy. In this guide, we’ve reviewed the best business VoIP solutions based on criteria like pricing, integrations, and ease of use, among others. Read on to learn how leaders like Ooma, RingCentral and Nextiva stack up against each other and find the VoIP best suited for your business.

The Best VoIP for Small Business Needs in 2023 | Quick Answer

Ooma stood out in our research and testing as the best small business VoIP phone system — it’s cloud-based and comes with an easy-to-use interface, automated closed captioning, and advanced analytics. Here’s how it fares against other popular small business VoIP solutions:

1. Ooma — The Best Quality VoIP Provider With a Quick Set Up | Offers a Generous 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee.
2. RingCentral — The Most Professional VoIP for Small Businesses | Try it Now With the 14-Day Free Trial.
3. Nextiva — The Best Small Business VoIP for Unlimited Calling on the Basic Plan | Put it to the Test With the 7-Day Free Trial and 14-Day Money-Back Guarantee.
4. 8×8 — The Best VoIP Phone Service for Small Business Team Management and Communication | Try the 30-Day Free Trial.
5. Phone.com — The Most Affordable Small Business VoIP | Cheap Monthly Plan, Try it Free for a Full Month.
6. MightyCall — Popular VoIP Solution With 2 Toll-Free Numbers | Offers a Week-Long Free Trial.
7. VoIPLy — The Best VoIP for Small Businesses After a Beginner-Friendly Solution | Has a 30-Day Guarantee.
8. DialPad — Leading Small Business VoIP With an Impeccable Voicemail Feature | Try the 14-Day Free Trial.

The Best VoIP for Small Business | Top 8 Reviewed

Here, we dive into the details of the best VoIP for small businesses to help you make an informed decision on the best one for your needs. We’ll explore their best features, and pricing, plus each one’s unique pros and cons. Ready?

1. Ooma — Quality VoIP Provider With a Quick Set Up

Ooma is a fantastic VoIP phone system for small businesses that can’t afford their own IT department.

With its patented autoconfiguration technology that makes setting up the software a breeze, Ooma claims that a user can go from setup to using its service in all its glory in less than 15 minutes — and real user reviews back this claim.

Furthermore, Ooma offers a set of 50+ features on all its plans. This includes ‘Call Transfer’, ‘Call Forwards’ during device outages, and ‘Ring Groups’ — as seen with DialPad. All these features together ensure that your callers have a pleasant, hurdle-fee experience.

Plus, thanks to Ooma’s ‘Call Logging’ functionality, your team will have an automated list of daily callers under the ‘Call Logs’ tab, making it a breeze to track call activity and team performance.

On top of this, to prevent your callers from being stranded when their calls are being transferred or they’re in the queue, you can also set up custom music which offers you the chance to appease agitated users and build a positive brand image.

Besides all this, Ooma also helps you cater to your team as much as it does to your callers. For instance, its ‘Call Parking’ feature lets your team members put a call on hold on one device and continue the same conversation from a different device. After all, small businesses with limited human resources need flexibility like this.

Ooma’s only shortcoming is that its features are quite limited, especially with the basic plan. If you want any of the advanced call-handling features, such as ‘Dynamic caller ID’ or call analytics, you’ll have to switch to a higher-tier plan.

Pricing:

Ooma, by and large, follows a pay-as-you-go pricing model. While the basic service is free and all that you have to pay for starting out is the equipment, you can keep adding features you want at a nominal fee:

For example, under the Ooma Home subscription, each virtual phone number will cost you $4.99/month. Premium voicemail transcription comes at $9.99/month. Plus, you can change your phone number or caller name for $19.99.

Then there are 3 Ooma Office plans. The cheapest and the best value-for-money is the Ooma Office Essentials, priced at $19.95/month/user.

You can try Ooma risk-free for a full month, thanks to its 30-day full refund policy.

2. RingCentral — Overall, the Best VoIP for Small Businesses

RingCentral is one of the most, if not the most, technologically advanced VoIP services with excellent call quality for small businesses.

Not only does RingCentral work with all internet-connected devices, including laptops and phones, but it also allows you to use analog phones to connect with your customers — as long as you have an Analog Telephone Adapter (ATA).

Having heavily invested in AI, RingCentral outperforms its competitors with advanced features, like automated closed captioning for audio/video conferences.

This feature helps the meeting participants understand the subject being discussed even if the audio quality is poor (or absent) or the participant is in noisy surroundings, and it’s an absolute godsend for customers and employees who have impaired hearing.

How does this feature help you? It’ll automatically transcribe the whole meeting, meaning you can keep a record of the discussion for future reference.

RingCentral’s AI transcription also extends to voicemails, where you can automatically extract the crux instead of wasting time listening to them all from start to finish.

As a small business, here are 2 more reasons you’ll love RingCentral:

Along with covering basic features like call recording, unlimited calls within the US and Canada, and offering phone or toll-free numbers to give your business a professional makeover, RingCentral takes its game a notch higher by simplifying internal communication as well.

For instance, you get features like team messaging, document sharing, unlimited fax, and 24-hour video meetings that can accommodate up to 200 participants. All these features ensure that, along with smoothly connecting to your callers, you can also maintain healthy internal communication among your team to serve your customers better.

Pricing:

Starting at $19.99/month/user for 1-20 users, RingCentral’s Essentials plan is one of the most affordable and feature-rich options out there.

RingCentral’s basic plan covers message and phone services, and there are video and open API solutions — upgrade your plan to unlock them.

You’ll also be thrilled to know that RingCentral has a free video plan that gives you unlimited video meetings and team messaging for up to 100 participants.

Enjoy all that RingCentral has to offer risk-free with its free video plan or the 14-day free trial on offer with its paid plans. If you don’t like it, cancel your subscription, and you won’t lose a cent.

3. Nextiva — The Best Small Business VoIP for Unlimited Calling on the Basic Plan

Nextiva is your best bet if you want your client-customer communication to be both unhindered and enjoyable.

For your team, it offers features like unlimited audio and video calling — even on the basic plan — so that your VoIP system allows for uninterrupted conversations.

For your customers, Nextiva offers a pleasant experience with a multi-level auto-attendant that caters to their questions and helps them with automated solutions if possible, and if those don’t help, it’ll direct them to the right agent on time.

Even if all your agents are busy on other lines, the callers in the queue will have an automated attendant to register and perhaps even solve their queries.

One of Nextiva’s standout features is the pre-recorded greetings you can use for callers. This will amp up the professional appeal of your company.

Besides all this, with Nextiva’s Enterprise plan, you can record up to 3 professional greetings to handle different sets of your target audience with an approach best suited for them.

It’s not hard to tell that Nextiva is quite big on appeasing callers in the queue. With the ‘Custom Music On-hold’ feature doubling up as the perfect on-hold marketing tool, you’ll be able to keep customers hooked even as they’re waiting.

To summarize it for you, Nextiva is one of the best Internet phone services and a feature-rich, comprehensive VoIP phone service that offers up to 45 advanced call management features, nationwide calling, free local and toll-free numbers, unlimited video/audio conferencing, HD voice quality, and more. There’s no reason you shouldn’t try it now.

Pricing:

Nextiva’s pricing is highly customizable — one of the many things we like about it. Here are your options:

The price of your plan will depend on 2 things:

1. The number of users
2. Whether you opt for a monthly, annual, 2-year, or 3-year subscription

The 3-year Essential plan priced at $17.95/user/month for 100+ users is the lowest Nexitva goes. If you’re a small team of 5-19 members, a 3-year subscription will cost you $21.95/user/month.

For more features, such as call and unlimited video conference recording, voicemail transcription, and 3 professionally recorded greetings, sign up for Nextiva’s Enterprise plan.

The best part? Nextiva comes with a 7-day free trial so see if it’s your cup of tea without any financial commitment.

4. 8×8 — The Best VoIP Phone Service for Small Business Team Management and Communication

8×8 has over 2 million customers worldwide who swear by its secure HD call quality and advanced team management features like ‘Presence Detection’ and ‘Hot Desking’.

As a small business, you might not have adequate resources to assign a separate VoIP calling system to each team member. With 8×8’s ‘Hot Desking’, you can have multiple team members use the same device as each of their own by simply entering their unique extension code.

If they’re busy or have to be away for a while, the ‘Presence Detection’ feature will change the status accordingly so that everyone on the team is kept updated.

Managing a team’s limited resources can be highly stressful, which is why 8×8 allows for seamless integration with team management platforms like Microsoft Teams. It’s impressive that 8×8 gives additional options to its users who don’t want to rely solely on 8×8’s internal communication features to manage their team.

That said, 8×8’s internal communication features are top-notch and include fun elements like interactive emojis, a hand-raising option, instant polls, and in-meeting chats, so we don’t see why you wouldn’t want to use them.

On top of this, 8×8’s detailed call analytics and special ‘Conversation IQ’ feature (for quality management speech analytics) give you the insight you need to provide your callers with a better experience.

Together, these two features will give you a closer look into the experience of individual callers, plus the overall performance of your team in terms of the success of the calls and customer satisfaction.

Pricing:

8×8 starts at an affordable $15/user/month for 1 year on its Express plan. This plan is best suited to small teams since it covers a good 5 members and comes with unlimited calling in the US and Canada.

However, if you’d like to experience 8×8 in its full glory, with unlimited calling to up to 14 countries, ‘hot desking’, ‘presence detection’, plus advanced call handling and analytics, consider investing in its premium packages.

Unsure? Try 8×8 risk-free for 30 days and see if it’s the best VoIP service for your needs.

5. Phone.com — The Most Affordable Small Business VoIP

Phone.com is easily the most affordable VoIP solution for your small business that doesn’t compromise on either features or support.

Although you only get one free phone number for your business with each Phone.com account, you can add as many subsequent numbers as you want at a very nominal fee.

Phone.com is a champion of simplifying communication. The VoIP system supports both calls and text messages, along with additional communication features for the team, including video/audio conferencing and chat.

Like 8×8, Phone.com, too, tags along with a diverse set of communication features that wouldn’t necessitate integration with any additional software — not that you can’t. In fact, all Pro users of Phone.com are eligible for app integration.

Overall, given that Phone.com has over 25+ advanced call management features, there’s a lot to talk about. Some of its unique offerings include:

With all these features at your disposal, handling bulk calls every day, even with a small team, will become a cakewalk, and your customers will get an impeccable experience as well — a win-win for both parties. Even if you miss a call, you can always get the voicemail transcription mailed to you.

Pricing:

Phone.com starts at only $11.99/month, making it the cheapest small business VoIP service on our list. The basic plan allows 10 participants for video conferencing, 500 pooled minutes, and 1,000 pooled text segments — more than enough if you have a small team with limited needs.

For unlimited minutes and text messages and features like call recording and voicemail transcription, go for Phone.com’s premium plans. At $23.99/month, Phone.com’s most feature-rich offering is on par with many VoIP services’ basic plans.

Sadly, Phone.com doesn’t come with a free trial, but you can still try it for a full month for a small fee, thanks to its cheap monthly subscription.

6. MightyCall — Popular VoIP Solution With 2 Toll-Free Numbers

MightyCall, as one of the best virtual phone service providers, goes out of its way to provide a flexible working environment for your team.

Unlike most popular VoIP services that only offer mobile and desktop apps and softphones, MightyCall also supports web phones. This means that you can use the platform to make and manage calls even without downloading the desktop app.

Every MightyCall user gets at least 2 toll-free or local numbers, on top of which, you can add as many additional company numbers as you want (both local and international numbers are available) at a very nominal price. This is quite similar to Phone.com, only that Phone.com provides 1 toll-free number.

Besides this, MightyCall will help you give your small business a more professional look with these features:

With a small team, you might not always have someone to cater to new callers. The above features will keep a caller on the line — without wasting their time, we may add — until you’re free to take over, boosting customer satisfaction.

One of our favorite features of MightyCall is the ‘Business Hour call routing’. Here, you can choose to have your calls redirected to a different number — for example, your personal number — after working hours so you don’t miss VIP clients.

Pricing:

MightyCall starts at just $15/user/month on its basic plan. Although the features are limited, like Phone.com, you get 2 users, 500 call minutes, and 100 texts. A small team? Go ahead with this plan.

The Enterprise plan isn’t priced as you’d expect. For a flat fee of $150/month, you’ll get unlimited minutes, texts, and users.

Try MightyCall risk-free with the 7-day free trial, and find out if it works the magic for you without risking a dime.

7. VoIPLy — The Best VoIP for Small Businesses After a Beginner-Friendly Solution

VoIPLy extends its HD VoIP phone services to a staggering 50+ countries and is on par with some of the industry’s best as far as call management features are concerned.

Although VoIPLy doesn’t provide a feature that’s out of the ordinary, it doesn’t miss out on essential features either. From ‘Call Forwarding’ to ‘Caller ID display’ and ‘Call Waiting Notification’, you get it all.

On the whole, what we believe makes VoIPLy a great pick for small businesses is its beginner-friendly setup process.

Small businesses can neither afford to hire a team of tech experts to handle new software installations nor put their business on hold to complete migrating to a new VoIP system. With VoIPLy, you don’t have to do either of those things.

Other commendable features include a seamless number porting feature — you can use your old business number on the new VoIPLy VoIP system.

On top of this, you’ll also have 24/7 access to a friendly customer support team available via phone, chat, email, and even social media. If you need any help with installation or post-setup, expert help would be just a click away. The best part? VoIPLy doesn’t charge any additional setup fees.

To make their services even more accessible to small businesses, VoIPLy lets you get started with any device of your choice, whether it be Android phones, PCs, or Mac or iOS-powered devices. Plus, you can also upgrade to a more professional-looking cordless WiFi phone — and you get three options here — whenever you’re ready.

Pricing:

We like how simple VoIPLy’s pricing is. There are two plans that are both billed annually:

No matter the plan, you’ll get unlimited calling to 50+ countries, customized call routing, and pretty much all that VoIPLy has to offer — yep, there are no plan-wise differences in features.

Put VoIPLy to the test today with the 30-day money-back guarantee. Don’t like it? Get a full refund.

8. DialPad — Leading Small Business VoIP With an Impeccable Voicemail Feature

DialPad, along with Nextiva, is the only VoIP solution to offer unlimited calling on all their plans, no matter whether you opt for the cheapest or the most expensive option.

There’s no dearth of features with DialPad. Call forwarding, custom routing, conference calling, you name it.

However, DialPad soars high on the back of its ‘Automated Spam Detection’ feature. You no longer have to manually find and block robocalls — DialPad will do it for you.

One of our favorite features of DialPad is its ‘Visual Voicemail’. Unlike regular voicemail that forces you to listen to each message chronologically, DialPad’s ‘Visual Voicemail’ comes with an interface that lets you pause, rewind, forward, or even skip a message, helping you reach the actual message you’re looking for much faster.

The reason DialPad is number 7 on our list is that the customer support on its Standard plan isn’t as comprehensive as RingCentral or 8×8.

For benefits like 24/7 live support, phone support, or a dedicated support number — all of which are easily available in the most basic plans of the top tools in our list — you’ll have to upgrade to one of DialPad’s premium plans.

But credit should be given where credit’s due — DialPad offers a unique call management feature that many of its competitors don’t — Ring Groups.

Since small business teams are often multi-tasking, the ‘Ring Group’ feature will make multiple devices ring for a single call (simultaneously or chronologically) so that even if one team member cannot pick it up, the other can, ensuring that the customer is heard.

Pricing:

At just $15/month/user, you get unlimited calling, SMS, and video meetings — something that most providers offer on their premium plans, but not DialPad.

If 100% uptime and unlimited ring groups and office locations sound like something you’d want, get in touch with DialPad for a custom quote for the Enterprise plan.

With a 14-day free trial, you’ll have ample time to find out whether DialPad is the one for you. No risk of losing any money. No hassle.

Best Small Business VoIP | Comparison Table

If you’re running late, this crisp table below delivers a quick overview of the top 8 VoIP services for small businesses — here are the key differences highlighted:

How Do VoIP Phone Systems Work?

VoIP phone systems basically convert your voice signals into digital signals, compress them and send them over the internet. This way, it’s easier to scale your organization’s communication needs and get everything done at a much lower price than traditional phone systems.

On top of that, all VoIP service providers offer virtual phone numbers. Since these numbers can be tied to any device of your choice, you get more flexibility, and your business gets a professional makeover.

Why Use a Business VoIP Service?

Why are we so big on using VoIP services? These points will make you share our perspective:

1. Cost Efficiency 

If you’re looking for an affordable communication solution for your team, VoIP is the perfect pick. Since these services use an internet connection to make phone calls, they charge you local rates even when you’re calling internationally.

Besides this, they don’t require you to install a separate phone system. Just imagine how much you can save on installation and maintenance by turning your current work device into a VoIP calling device.

2. Scalability

With VoIP, you can make calls from anywhere in the world. Since you won’t be tied to any particular phone system, it becomes much easier to scale your business worldwide. Also, since you’re saving money by switching to VoIP from traditional lines, you can reinvest that into expanding your business.

3. Ideal for Remote Teams 

These top 3 VoIP benefits:

1. Calls are made over the internet
2. Your entire team will be on the same platform
3. You don’t need to install a separate phone system to access it

Make it the perfect communication tool for your remote team — they’ll be able to keep in sync and get all the updates they need about customer queries and calls directly from the platform instead of bugging another employee for updates.

4. Better Communication 

VoIP phone services centralize your communication. For example, if you’ve got a regular phone, each time a customer calls, your team will have to update the system manually. But with a VoIP phone service, everyone uses the same platform and has access to all the necessary documents.

On top of that, most of these VoIP service providers also provide internal communication options like team chat and video conferencing. So instead of investing in a separate team management software, you can manage both internal and external communication on the same platform.

How We Chose Our Options of the Best VoIP for Small Business 

These are the main things you need to look for when choosing the perfect VoIP provider for your small business:

1. Usability 

Just because you’re introducing new software to your team doesn’t mean you can put work on hold until they get the hang of it, especially in a small business where the resources are already limited. That’s why you need a VoIP service that’s easy to install and use. The platforms that we’ve picked have a minimal learning curve.

Even if your team isn’t tech-savvy, they’ll get the hang of it soon enough. And in case you run into any major problem, most of these offer 24/7 customer support.

2. Advanced Call Handling 

Small teams require extra assistance from their company tools and software in managing the workload. That’s where advanced call-handling features step in.

For example, if your small team is already busy on different lines, a virtual receptionist could handle other callers in the queue and direct them to the right agent. Similarly, if you have limited phone systems, hot desking will let you switch between them flexibly with just a simple extension code.

3. Team Capacity 

Small businesses don’t require a team capacity of 100 or more. So make sure whatever service you pick has a plan suitable for your needs. After all, why should you pay for a plan that’s meant for 50 people when you have a small team of 5?

That being said, the VoIP service should also be scalable. Along with small business-friendly plans, it should also have plans for medium-sized or enterprise-level businesses so that your company can keep growing without needing to switch platforms.

4. Integrations

No one tool can meet all your needs, and that’s why it’s so important to choose a platform that doesn’t restrict you to itself. The best way to thrive in this digital age is for business tools to cooperate and coexist.

So when looking for the best small business VoIP service providers, we only looked for platforms that permit integration with other popular business tools like Slack or Microsoft 365 to give you the option to further optimize your day-to-day operations.

How to Get Started with a VoIP provider for Small Businesses

Starting up a small business can be a nightmare, but VoIP services are far easier to set up than the used to be. This is especially true with services like Ooma. Here’s what you have to do:

Step 1 — Purchase an Ooma VoIP Handset

Visit the Ooma website by clicking the link down below. From there, you’ll want to choose a Business or Residential plan based on your needs. In this case, you’ll need to register a Business plan in order to get access to the premium features Ooma provides.

You’ll have to purchase an Ooma business phone through various third-party vendors such as Best Buy, Costco, or Amazon. Remember, Ooma comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee no matter where you’ve purchased a handset from.

Step 2 — Register your Ooma device

Before you can use your Ooma device, you’ll need to register it to activate the subscription plan. For Business users, you’ll have to register your Ooma handset devices using the MAC address or Activation code found on the bottom of the phone.

To register your Ooma device, go to “Login” on the homepage and then select “My Ooma Office”. You’ll be taken to a login page, from there you’ll have to click “Sign up for Ooma office” to get to the registration page.

The MAC or Activation code is located on the bottom of your Ooma device, which is helpfully pointed out during the activation process.

After this step, you’ll be asked to enter some basic details about your location and billing if you’re going with one of Ooma’s paid plans, but it’s all pretty straightforward. From there, the autoconfiguration will take care of the rest!

Small Business VoIP FAQs