Are high phone bills draining your budget?
Traditional desk phones are not just costly, they chain your staff to the office. This makes supporting a productive remote team nearly impossible.
It leads to missed opportunities and frustrated customers when your team can’t answer calls from anywhere. It also complicates collaboration.
Many businesses find themselves overpaying for hardware, maintenance, and per-minute call charges on legacy systems. The cost of inaction quietly adds up every single month.
The right software can solve this by moving your entire phone system to the cloud, letting you make calls from any device.
In this guide, I’ll break down the best softphone software to help you choose the right fit. We’ll look beyond features to focus on real-world use cases.
You’ll discover how to slash telephony costs while giving your remote employees the professional tools they need to stay connected and productive.
Let’s dive in.
Quick Summary:
| # | Software | Rating | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | RingCentral → | Large enterprises and IT directors | |
| 2 | Nextiva → | Mid-sized businesses | |
| 3 | Zoom → | Mid-sized businesses | |
| 4 | GoTo → | Mid-sized businesses | |
| 5 | Dialpad → | Mid-sized businesses |
1. RingCentral
Struggling with outdated communication systems?
RingCentral offers an AI-powered platform integrating calls, messages, and meetings, ideal for modernizing your business communications.
This means you can streamline workflows, centralize communication, and say goodbye to missed calls with a 24/7 digital concierge.
It’s time to simplify your communications.
RingCentral brings your employee and customer experiences together, empowering every team member with AI-powered tools across all devices.
You can leverage their AI Receptionist for accurate call routing and text follow-ups, reducing missed calls and enhancing customer service. Their platform ensures effortless customer experiences powered by AI, optimizing agent management and improving satisfaction.
Additionally, with Conversation Intelligence, you unlock value from every customer interaction through automated recordings, real-time insights, and AI-powered coaching, all deeply integrated with your CRM. This comprehensive approach helps you reduce costs and boost remote team efficiency.
The result is seamless, intelligent communication.
If you’re also looking into managing devices for your team, my article on mobile device management software covers essential solutions.
Key features:
- AI Receptionist: Offers 24/7 support with AI that answers questions, routes callers, and sends texts, handling a high volume of calls efficiently.
- Conversation Intelligence: Provides automated recordings, customer and deal insights, instant summaries, and AI-powered coaching, integrated with your CRM.
- Open Platform Integrations: Connects with over 300 pre-built integrations like Microsoft Teams, Salesforce, and HubSpot, or allows custom integrations via APIs.
Learn more about RingCentral features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: RingCentral is a leading contender for the best softphone software, offering a robust AI-powered platform with capabilities like the AI Receptionist, Conversation Intelligence, and seamless CRM integrations. Trusted by over 400,000 organizations, it helps businesses like First Bank achieve 30% annual phone system cost savings, making it ideal for IT directors and procurement managers seeking scalable, efficient communication solutions.
2. Nextiva
Are you struggling with fragmented communication systems?
Nextiva centralizes all your customer interactions into one AI-powered platform. This means you can handle voice, live chat, SMS, and social media from a single interface.
Your current systems might lack crucial integrations, leading to siloed data and missed opportunities. Nextiva’s unified platform and API integrations solve this by connecting all customer touchpoints.
Here’s how you can gain better control.
Nextiva offers a Unified-CXM platform that orchestrates customer journeys to acquire, retain, and grow your customer base. You can engage customers across any channel with personalized, context-driven support.
This platform helps you operate more efficiently by reducing cost per interaction with AI and automation, boosting workforce productivity. Its robust ACD algorithms and intelligent routing ensure that calls are directed effectively. Additionally, you can maximize your technology investments by consolidating and integrating various tools, reducing IT overhead.
Nextiva also provides real-time dashboards and customizable analytics widgets, offering deep insights into customer sentiment and operational performance. Plus, features like generative AI knowledge base and transcription with summarization streamline agent workflows.
This empowers your remote teams.
Before diving deeper, you might find my analysis of best call monitoring software helpful.
Key features:
- Unified Agent Experience: Centralizes customer interactions across voice, chat, SMS, and social media channels for seamless communication and enhanced customer service.
- AI-Powered Automation: Includes intelligent routing, speech-to-text transcription, and sentiment analysis to optimize workflows, reduce costs, and boost productivity.
- Comprehensive Analytics: Offers real-time dashboards, custom reports, and voice analytics, providing actionable insights for improving customer journeys and operational efficiency.
Learn more about Nextiva features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Nextiva stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, especially for mid-sized businesses seeking comprehensive communication solutions. Its Unified-CXM platform, robust AI capabilities, and extensive API integrations help you reduce costs and enhance customer satisfaction, empowering your remote teams with powerful tools.
3. Zoom
Is your current phone system holding your team back? Many IT Directors like you struggle with outdated communication tools that lack essential integrations.
Zoom Phone directly addresses this by offering a cloud phone system. You can connect your team and customers easily.
This platform helps you ditch complex legacy systems, providing straightforward call management features that integrate seamlessly. You’ll avoid the headaches of disjointed communication.
Here’s how Zoom offers a fresh solution.
You can streamline your business communications with a unified platform for phone, video, meetings, and chat. This consolidates your tools, simplifying management.
Zoom Phone offers reliable voice features like call routing and voicemail, all designed to keep your remote teams connected and productive. You get enterprise-grade reliability without complex hardware.
Additionally, this solution supports international calling and provides easy administration, allowing you to manage users and features from a central hub. This means your global teams can stay connected, enhancing overall collaboration and customer interactions, reducing the time your IT team spends on troubleshooting.
Stay connected, anywhere, anytime.
If your business relies on integrating multiple software solutions, you might also find my analysis of best ecommerce integration platform helpful.
Key features:
- Unified Communication Platform: Combines phone, video, meetings, and chat into one interface, simplifying daily operations and improving team collaboration efficiency.
- Reliable Cloud Phone System: Delivers enterprise-grade voice features, including call routing, voicemail, and international calling, ensuring consistent communication for your remote teams.
- Easy Administration: Provides a centralized hub for managing users and features, empowering IT directors to streamline setup and maintenance without complex technical hurdles.
Learn more about Zoom features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Zoom Phone stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, particularly for mid-sized businesses looking to consolidate communication tools. Its unified platform and reliable cloud phone system address common pain points like disjointed workflows and complex administration, helping your team achieve better connectivity and improved productivity.
4. GoTo
Struggling with outdated softphone systems and rising costs?
GoTo Connect offers an all-in-one cloud communication platform, including a softphone, designed to simplify your organization’s connectivity. This means you can centralize your business phone system and communication channels.
GoTo Connect boasts over 100 features, supporting every communication need, allowing you to replace disparate tools with a unified solution.
This simplifies your IT management.
Here’s how GoTo Connect helps you achieve your desired outcomes: it combines a cloud-based business phone system with a robust softphone. You get a comprehensive suite of customer experience tools all within one solution, enabling effortless scaling.
This includes capabilities like the AI Receptionist, a 24/7 smart assistant that handles incoming calls and automates tasks, ensuring no customer inquiries are missed. Plus, GoTo Connect offers an AI-powered omnichannel contact center solution to empower agents and inform supervisors, making IT management easy. The result is improved customer service and reduced workload for your team.
Make every call count.
Key features:
- All-in-one communication platform: Offers an AI-powered cloud communication solution that is easy to use, manage, and scale, centralizing your business phone system.
- AI Receptionist: Provides a 24/7 smart assistant built directly into GoTo Connect to handle incoming calls, automate tasks, and ensure no customer inquiry is missed.
- Comprehensive customer experience tools: Integrates a robust phone system, softphone, digital channels, and advanced reporting for unbeatable value in one solution.
Learn more about GoTo features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: GoTo Connect stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, offering a comprehensive, AI-powered cloud communications platform. With its integrated AI Receptionist and 100+ features, it helps mid-sized businesses streamline operations, enhance customer experience, and reduce communication costs. As IT Manager Todd H. from BMW of Murray noted, unifying texting, faxing, and reporting into one central location is a huge upside.
5. Dialpad
Are your current phone systems holding you back? Dialpad offers an AI-powered customer communications platform designed to streamline every interaction. This means you can elevate conversations across calls, messages, and meetings.
Dialpad’s proprietary AI delivers real-time insights for your team. This ensures unmatched accuracy and predictable costs by leveraging a purpose-built model.
This focus on advanced AI helps solve common pain points.
Dialpad solves communication challenges with its robust platform. It brings your teams and workflows together on a dual-cloud architecture designed for best-in-class resiliency and reliability.
You can expect instant AI summaries and action items, enhancing your team’s productivity. It integrates with essential apps like Salesforce, Zendesk, and Google Workspace, ensuring your business runs smoothly. Additionally, Dialpad offers next-gen contact center solutions with AI agents, assistants, and coaching, along with outbound sales call features that provide real-time AI coaching, insights, and automations, simplifying complex workflows and driving efficiency.
Experience sharper insights and remarkable outcomes.
Key features:
- AI-Powered Communication: Elevate every conversation with real-time AI insights, providing instant summaries, action items, and coaching for calls, messages, and meetings.
- Seamless Integrations: Connect with your existing business applications, including Salesforce, Zendesk, Microsoft Teams, and Google Workspace, for a smooth and unified workflow.
- Reliable and Scalable Platform: Benefit from a dual-cloud architecture designed for best-in-class resiliency and reliability, supporting over 30,000 customers in 70+ countries.
Learn more about Dialpad features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Dialpad’s focus on AI-powered real-time insights and robust integrations makes it the best softphone software for mid-sized businesses seeking to cut costs and boost remote team efficiency. Your team can save 10% of time with AI-powered transcriptions and gain 20% efficiency, making it an excellent choice for improving customer interactions and operational effectiveness.
6. 8×8
Struggling with outdated communication systems?
8×8 offers one intelligent platform to connect your employees and customers globally, designed to deliver the outcomes that matter most for your business. This means you can centralize communication management and reduce telephony costs.
Their platform helps you elevate customer experience, maximize operational efficiencies, and modernize your legacy systems, all while building customer trust through secure and compliant communications. The result is simplified operations and delighted customers.
How about smarter conversations and simpler stacks?
8×8 solves communication challenges through its unified platform. Their Contact Center, powered by AI, simplifies operations for agents, while 8×8 Work provides an AI-enabled communications suite for global teams.
You can also leverage 8×8’s no-code Communications APIs to connect with customers on their preferred channels, all from one platform. Additionally, 8×8 Engage empowers all customer-facing teams to support customers with ease. This comprehensive approach ensures you have the right tools to achieve significant impact.
They’ve helped customers like San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance get data they never had before, resulting in more calls answered and increased revenue.
The outcome? Measurable impact and streamlined workflows.
Key features:
- Unified Communications Platform connects employees and customers globally through an AI-enabled communications suite, simplifying contact center operations and enhancing team collaboration.
- AI-Powered Contact Center provides powerful automation and data-driven insights to maximize operational efficiencies, enabling your agents to delight customers and become a well-oiled CX machine.
- Secure and Compliant Communications ensures customer trust through accessible communications, mitigating risk and allowing you to modernize your systems to stay ahead in your industry.
Learn more about 8×8 features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: 8×8 provides a robust, unified platform ideal for mid-sized businesses seeking the best softphone software. Its AI-powered solutions and secure, compliant communications help you maximize operational efficiencies and elevate customer experiences, offering a powerful alternative to outdated systems and ensuring a significant return on your investment.
7. Ooma
Struggling with complex, costly business communication systems?
Ooma simplifies your communication infrastructure, integrating phone, video, and messaging. This means less hassle for your IT department.
You can gain control over your telephony expenses, knowing you’re investing in a solution built for seamless scalability and adaptability. This addresses your need to justify ROI without fear of vendor lock-in.
Transition to a truly unified communication experience.
Ooma offers business phone service with features like a desktop app and mobile app, ensuring your remote teams stay connected from anywhere. This solves the challenge of supporting a flexible workforce with reliable mobility.
You’ll find capabilities such as videoconferencing, team chat, and call recording, all designed to enhance collaboration and productivity. Ooma also provides voicemail transcription and text messaging, reducing onboarding times and improving communication efficiency. Additionally, CRM integrations with Salesforce, HubSpot, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 streamline workflows and centralize customer interactions, directly impacting your customer service experiences and reducing handling times.
This empowers your teams to excel.
While discussing business software solutions, you might also find my article on best app builder software helpful for launching your own applications without coding.
Key features:
- Comprehensive Communication: Offers integrated phone, video, and messaging solutions, customizable for businesses of any size.
- Mobile and Desktop Accessibility: Provides dedicated desktop and mobile apps, enabling seamless communication for remote and on-the-go teams.
- CRM Integration: Features direct integrations with major CRM platforms like Salesforce, HubSpot, and Microsoft Dynamics 365, streamlining customer interactions.
Learn more about Ooma features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Ooma is an excellent contender for best softphone software, offering comprehensive business phone services with key features like mobile and desktop apps, videoconferencing, and vital CRM integrations. Its focus on unified communication and cost savings positions it well for IT Directors and Procurement Managers seeking scalable solutions that enhance remote team productivity.
8. CloudTalk
Are outdated systems holding your teams back?
CloudTalk addresses this by offering immediate deployment and robust CRM integration with platforms like Salesforce and HubSpot. This means your IT and Procurement teams can deploy a comprehensive call center in under an hour.
You’ll find CloudTalk helps you to cut down on missed connections, callbacks, and transfers. The result is a system that enhances overall efficiency.
Elevate your communication strategy today.
CloudTalk helps you streamline operations with advanced features, whether you’re a sales or customer support team, or even managing remote operations. It offers 160+ local calling numbers, ensuring global reach and helping your sales team connect with 2x more prospects using features like the Power Dialer. This also helps reduce churn and boost customer satisfaction for support teams by ensuring crystal-clear call quality.
Additionally, AI-powered tools like AI Voice Agents can handle routine calls 24/7, while Conversation Intelligence provides smart insights for better coaching and faster analysis, cutting analysis time by 80%. Their Caller ID Branding feature shows your company name and logo, encouraging higher pick-up rates. Plus, you can reach clients where they already are, thanks to WhatsApp messaging integration for both inbound and outbound communications.
CloudTalk ensures your business phone system speeds up lead generation and provides reliable, scalable calling.
Key features:
- AI-Powered Productivity Tools: Automate tasks like dialing and lead qualification with AI Dialer and AI Voice Agents, allowing your human agents to focus on high-value conversations and reducing analysis time by 80%.
- Global Connectivity & Quality: Access 160+ local calling numbers and leverage a multi-carrier network for worldwide reach and crystal-clear call quality, ensuring reliable performance even for remote teams.
- Seamless CRM & Helpdesk Integrations: Connect effortlessly with popular tools like Salesforce, HubSpot, Zendesk, and Zoho CRM to unify data, streamline workflows, and ensure a 360-degree view of your customer interactions.
Learn more about CloudTalk features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: CloudTalk stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, particularly for mid-sized businesses looking to optimize communication. With features like AI Voice Agents and robust CRM integration with Salesforce and HubSpot, CloudTalk helps reduce missed calls by 23.7% and increases call volume by 81.7%, demonstrating clear ROI through enhanced productivity and reduced operational costs.
9. Zoiper
Struggling with fragmented communication and high phone costs?
Zoiper offers a unified VoIP softphone experience across all major platforms, from desktop to mobile. This means you can centralize your communication, regardless of your team’s device.
This addresses the pain point of incompatible systems, allowing your IT and procurement teams to implement a consistent solution without workflow disruptions.
Here’s how Zoiper can transform your communication.
Zoiper tackles these challenges by integrating advanced features like AI call transcription, automated summaries, and crucial call insights. This provides valuable analytics, essential for your team to understand call performance and identify trends.
You can also leverage its CRM and address book integration, seamlessly pulling contacts from Outlook, Windows, Mac, and mobile devices. This ensures your team knows who is calling before they even answer, improving efficiency. Additionally, Zoiper supports military-grade encryption for all audio and video calls, using TLS, SRTP, and ZRTP, giving you peace of mind regarding sensitive conversations.
Plus, its lightweight design, written in C/C++ and Assembly, ensures low memory and CPU usage for high-quality audio, even on older hardware, which means a smoother experience for your users and less strain on your IT resources.
Connect your team with seamless, secure communication.
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Key features:
- AI Feature Integration: Get automated summaries, titles, and important bits from call recordings, enhancing productivity and enabling data-driven insights for your team.
- Cross-Platform Accessibility: Run Zoiper natively on Windows, Linux, Mac, Android, and iOS, providing consistent functionality across your team’s diverse devices.
- Secure VoIP Communications: Utilize military-grade encryption (TLS, SRTP, ZRTP) for all audio and video calls, ensuring the privacy and security of your business conversations.
Learn more about Zoiper features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Zoiper stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, offering a robust set of features like AI-powered call insights and military-grade encryption. Its cross-platform compatibility and seamless CRM integration make it ideal for mid-sized businesses seeking to reduce telephony costs and boost remote team productivity.
10. Aircall
Are you missing critical customer calls and context?
Aircall provides AI Voice Agents and AI Assist, ensuring 24/7 autonomous call handling and real-time conversation intelligence. This means your IT and procurement teams can confidently deploy a system that prevents lost leads and context.
Here’s how Aircall addresses this directly, empowering your sales and support teams to manage all business conversations from one central location.
Aircall solves this by being a unified communication and intelligence platform.
This platform offers features like AI Voice Agents that autonomously handle and qualify inbound calls around the clock, meaning you never miss an opportunity. Additionally, AI Assist provides real-time conversation intelligence, helping your team prepare and follow up effectively to enhance every customer interaction. Plus, with WhatsApp integration, you can reach billions of users directly from Aircall’s unified hub, combining calls, texts, and messaging for complete omnichannel support.
The result? Better conversations, clearer metrics, and significant business impact.
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Key features:
- AI Voice Agent and AI Assist: Provides 24/7 autonomous call handling and real-time conversation intelligence to ensure no calls are missed and every interaction is optimized for sales and support.
- 100+ Integrations (Salesforce, HubSpot): Connects seamlessly with your existing CRM, help desk, and other critical tools, streamlining workflows and providing agents with crucial customer context.
- Comprehensive Call Analytics & Reporting: Offers powerful analytics to monitor performance, identify trends, and make data-driven decisions, reducing guesswork and improving team productivity.
Learn more about Aircall features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Aircall stands out as a strong contender for the best softphone software, particularly for mid-sized businesses focused on enhancing customer service and sales. Its AI-powered features, extensive CRM integrations like Salesforce and HubSpot, and comprehensive analytics deliver seamless communication, ensuring that your remote teams remain productive and your customers always feel connected.
Conclusion
Ready to fix your phone costs?
I get it, choosing is tough. Many platforms lack the CRM integrations and seamless mobility your remote team needs to cut costs and boost productivity.
Cloud-based softphone solutions reduce upfront hardware costs and support remote teams with real-time updates. This shift is key to lowering operational expenses and enhancing productivity.
So what’s my top recommendation?
After reviewing all the options, RingCentral stands out. Its powerful, AI-driven platform directly tackles the challenges of outdated communication systems and supports distributed workforces.
I was especially impressed by their AI Receptionist and the proven 30% annual savings for businesses like First Bank. It’s the best softphone software for unifying your stack.
For businesses looking to secure their customer experience, my analysis of best Android kiosk software provides valuable perspectives.
I highly recommend you explore RingCentral’s free trial to see how its features can directly impact your bottom line and team efficiency.
It’s a clear path to savings.
