RingCentral and Vonage have had their say for residential VoIP service as an alternative to landlines, cell phone services, and conventional phones. While the technical premise of utilizing an analog telephone adapter (ATA) is the same for these two unified communications providers, there are differences in features, ease of use, accessibility, and after-safes services.
Here is a breakdown of the differences between these two and an outline of the benefits of each and their weaknesses to help you determine which is better for you.
What is RingCentral?
RingCentral is a unified cloud-based communications provider offering a streamlined communications suite for conferencing, calls, videos, and more. Its flexible MVP (Message, Video, and Phone) plans offer complete team management and communication solutions tailored for small and large businesses. These plans are designed to meet the needs, solve businesses’ challenges, and fully optimize team projects and workflow. RingCentral has an open API that integrates with many business tools and software applications.
What is Vonage?
Vonage is a CPaaS (Communications Platform as a Service) provider that allows users to connect and communicate on any device through cloud-hosted SMS, chat, video, and voice. It supports small and corporate enterprises’ online meetings, conferencing, collaboration, and contact centers. Vonage’s Nexmo API platform allows developers to integrate voice, messaging, and authentication into applications without creating backend infrastructure.
RingCentral VS Vonage
Here are the differences between RingCentral and Vonage to help you make a purchase decision.
At a glance: RingCentral vs Vonage
| RingCentral | Vonage | |
| Price | $19.99 to $49.99 per user per month | $19.99 to $37.99 per user, per month** |
| Free trial | 15-day free trial period | 14-day free trial period |
| Unlimited Domestic Calls and Short | Yes | Yes |
| Message Service (SMS) Texts | Yes | Yes |
| Video Conferencing | Up to 200-participants | Up to 100-participants |
| Team Messaging | Yes | Yes |
| Integrations | 200 plus integrations | Only 17 integrations |
| Uptime Service Level Agreement (SLA) | 99.999% | 99.999% |
| Customer Support | 24/7 chat and phone support | 24/7 chat and phone support |
| Advanced Features | Voicemail transcription, high-definition (HD) audio and video, call monitoring, real-time analytics, and single sign-on (SSO) | AI virtual assistant, Call flip, HD voice, SMS automation, music on hold and voicemail-to-email |
Plans
RingCentral has four plans which include RingCentral Essentials (Message, Phone), RingCentral Standard (Message, Video, Phone), RingCentral Premium (Message, Video, Phone, Open API), and RingCentral Ultimate (Message, Video, Phone, Open API). RingCentral Essentials is the most basic and popular plan, which supports up to 20 users.
Vonage also has three plans which include the mobile plan, premium plan, and advanced plan. Vonage Premium is the most popular plan, which supports unlimited meetings for up to 100.
The winner here is RingCentral which has more plans and features to serve both small and large businesses.
Pricing/Affordability
Price plays an important role when choosing a unified communications provider.
RingCentral Essentials cost $19.99 per user per month, RingCentral Standard costs $27.99 per user per month, RingCentral Premium costs $34.99 per user per month, and RingCentral Ultimate costs $49.99 per user per month.
Vonage Mobile costs $19.99 per line, Vonage Premium costs $24.99 per line, and the advanced plan costs $34.99 per line per month.
Many businesses appreciate the a la carte pricing options offered by Vonage. Both have the most basic budget-friendly plan costing $19.99 per user per month. Instead of investing a lot of money on an advanced plan with more features you might not need, you can choose Vonage’s starter plan and buy premium add-on features separately.
Read More: MagicJack VS Vonage
Free trial
RingCentral offers a 15-day free trial only available to new subscribers. You can extend the free trial period by taking advantage of Vonage’s 30-day risk-free money-back guarantee. You will get 50 minutes of domestic calls with each free trial subscription.
Vonage plans come with a 14-day free trial. Unfortunately, the company has not indicated this on its official website. With RingCentral, the free trial option is shown next to the “buy now” button.
Features
RingCentral’s Essentials plan supports up to 20 users only. Other features include business phone or toll-free numbers, Enhanced Business SMS, unlimited calls within the US/Canada, voicemail-to-text, document sharing, and team messaging. You can also upgrade to higher plans which have no limit on the number of users and offers more advanced features such as business phone numbers in over 100 countries, unlimited audio conferencing, unlimited internet fax, up to 24-hour meeting duration, video meetings with up to 100 participants, integrations, 24/7 support and more. You can get them on RingCentral’s Ultimate plan if you want unlimited storage, device status reports, and device status alerts.
Vonage’s Mobile plan includes mobile and desktop apps, unlimited calls and SMS, unlimited team messaging, and a Vonage app center. You can upgrade to a higher plan to access advanced features such as unlimited meetings for up to 100, IP desk phone capability, multi-level auto attendant, CRM integration, call recording, and more.
At a glance, both RingCentral and Vonage offer essential Unified communications as a Service (UCaaS) communication channels, including team messaging, video conferencing, audio conferencing, texting, and voice calling. However, RingCentral offers better phone system management and call handling features than Vonage. For instance, RingCentral customers enjoy real-time analytics, single sign-on (SSO), hot-desking, and other advanced features. With Vonage, you might not get the more advanced features offered by RingCentral, but the provider still delivers beyond the essentials.
Read More: Google Voice Alternatives.
Videos conferencing
RingCentral’s customers get HD audio and videos, with its video conferencing supporting up to 200 participants. During conferencing, you can adjust your settings in the gallery view to view up to 25 screens simultaneously. Other unique video conferencing features of RingCentral include one-click call-to-video and niche video conferencing functionality, which Vonage misses.
Vonage’s video conferencing supports up to 100 participants. Unfortunately, Vonage’s video conferencing quality is of low quality compared to what you get with RingCentral. The provider does not offer HD videos, but users who host meetings enjoy HD voice as an add-on at an additional cost.
If you compare the two, you will find that RingCentral provides one of the highest-quality video conferencing solutions compared to Vonage.
Ease of use
Vonage is the best option for a business looking for an easy-to-use interface as the users enjoy a simple and easy-to-navigate interface across desktop and mobile applications. The company provides a user guide to help users navigate through the platform.
RingCentral, on the other hand, has a modern user interface. Its robust features confuse the interface—new users who want to find an exact tool take more time navigating the platform. Fortunately, the company has a knowledge base known as RingCentral University, which helps users understand how the platform works.
See Also: Google Voice vs. Vonage.
Integrations
When it comes to integrations, RingCentral offers far more integration compared to Vonage. RingCentral integrates with more than 290 third-party applications, including analytics software, customer support tools, and customer relationship managers (CRMs). If there is a tool that your business relies on, there is a likelihood of RingCentral integrating with it.
Vonage supports only 17 popular integrations. These business applications that integrate with Vonage include Zendesk, Zapier, HubSpot, Google, Microsoft, and Salesforce.
Support
RingCentral provides 24/7 customer support through phone and a live chat feature. The company also provides access to professional implementation support, consulting services, and ongoing support.
Vonage also offers 24/7 customer service and tech support. The company also offers additional support and consultation services at a fee. Based on customer reviews and testimonials, Vonage has a slight edge with its support services.
Artificial Intelligence
Vonage’s business phone system has an AI virtual assistant feature that facilitates conversations, transcribes conversations, streamlines workflows, and analyzes customer sentiment in real time without human interaction.
RingCentral is behind when it comes to AI usage. Unlike Vonage’s AI, which does almost everything, RingCentral offers limited AI usage, such as improving video meetings. Otherwise, the provider acquired more innovative technology and is actively trying to upgrade its AI integration game.
Vonage and RingCentral are unified communications platforms with robust features designed to connect users anywhere on any device. Even though these two providers come with a slightly different mix of plans and features, they have similarities that eliminate the hustle of making a purchase decision. These similarities include excellent reliability and call quality, a virtual receptionist, and no-download, one-click meetings for guests.
Is RingCentral real?
RingCentral is a genuine unified communications provider with several positive reviews and testimonials. It’s ranked among the top 5 communications services offering robust collaborative and VoIP features. But if your business values scalability and flexibility, RingCentral offers the best bang for your buck.
Why is RingCentral the best?
RingCentral wins over Vonage thanks to its robust features, such as greater meeting capacity, single sign-on (SSO), unlimited storage, and real-time analytics. Top-notch integrations with leading business applications and the highest-quality video conferencing solutions are other reasons that make RingCentral a clear winner of the two providers.
