Pros
- Numerous integrations & apps
- User-friendly UI
- Features are easy to use
- Good security & compliance
- Suitable for small businesses
Cons
- Expensive pricing
- Non-transparent equipment pricing
- Poor customer service
What Is Vonage?
Since the early 2000s, Vonage has been a pioneer of VoIP. In addition to household telephone service, the company offers Vonage Business Communications (VBC), a unified communications platform that connects businesses and customers through voice, messaging, and video.
Vonage offers a nice set of features suitable for small businesses—everything from standard call forwarding and call blocking to more advanced options like video conferencing and on-demand recording. Unfortunately, some of these features come at a price.
Vonage’s pricing is a little steep when compared to its competitors, and some features are only available as add-ons that come with an additional fee. The company’s customer service also leaves a lot to be desired.
However, Vonage still has a lot going for it. Find out if the pros outweigh the cons and see if this VoIP phone system is the best option for your business.
Vonage Pricing
Vonage business phone plans start at $19.99 per month per line.
Vonage Plans |
Price |
When To Use |
Mobile |
$19.99/month per line |
You want to use a VoIP app on your phone or computer |
Premium |
$29.99/month per line |
You need VoIP phones and features like video meetings |
Advanced |
$39.99/month per line |
You want access to additional communication features |
Vonage also offers promotions for new customers. The current promotion provides you with 30% off any plan for the first 12 months. This is available only when you pay for an annual subscription upfront.
Discounts are also available if you have multiple lines. You can figure out your monthly or annual pricing with Vonage’s built-in calculator by simply entering your number of employees. For example, lines for 10 employees cost $17.99/month per line on the Mobile plan, while lines for 20 employees drop to $14.99/month per line.
There are also several add-ons that you can purchase that will increase your monthly bill. We’ll dive into the specifics of those in the next section.
Overall, Vonage’s pricing isn’t the most expensive we’ve seen, but it’s certainly not the cheapest. If you want to actually use VoIP phones, you have to upgrade to the more expensive Premium plan. We took all of this into consideration when giving Vonage a score of 3.7/5 for its pricing.
Vonage Extra Costs & Fees
Vonage has plenty of add-on features — most of which will add to your monthly pricing.
Vonage Extra Costs |
Price |
Flat Rate Toll-Free Number |
$49.99/month |
Local Company Number |
$9.99/month |
Voicemail Transcription |
$4.99/month |
Paperless Fax |
$14.99/month |
Business Number Inbox |
$9.99/month |
Call Recording |
$4.99/month |
Txt2Pay |
$25/month |
Call Group |
$4.99/month |
Call Queue |
$14.99/month |
Paging Group |
$4.99/month |
Vonage Support Plus |
$9.99/month |
Remote Go Live Support |
$200/hour |
Virtual Receptionist Recording |
$29.99 |
Integrations |
$0 to $4.99/month |
Here’s a quick breakdown of Vonage’s available add-ons:
- Flat rate toll-free number: This provides you with a toll-free number with unlimited usage that is priced at a flat rate of $49.99 per month.
- Local company number: This feature allows you to use a phone number with any area code to expand your market.
- Voicemail transcription: This feature transcribes your voicemails and sends them to your designated email inbox.
- Paperless fax: This allows you to send and receive digital faxes from your phone or computer.
- Business number inbox: You and your employees can send and receive texts and messages through Facebook Messenger from your main number, with responses compiled in a single inbox.
- Call recording: This allows you and your employees to easily record phone calls on demand.
- Txt2Pay: This option allows you to request and receive invoice payments by text.
- Call group: This lets callers reach an entire department with one call.
- Call queue: The call queue serves as a virtual waiting room for incoming callers.
- Paging group: This feature lets you send broadcasts and alerts to a select group or your entire team.
- Vonage Support Plus: This feature gives you access to unlimited support.
- Remote Go Live Support: A Vonage engineer will provide remote support for you and your team.
- Virtual receptionist recording: This is an audio recording made from a script you provide.
- Integrations: Vonage integrates with various programs, including CRM.
In addition to your monthly subscription and add-ons, taxes and fees will also be charged on your bill.
Vonage Equipment
One area where we feel Vonage falls a bit short is its equipment. If you want to use a VoIP phone, you’ll have to subscribe to the Premium plan. Then, if you want to purchase your hardware from Vonage, the options are pretty limited.
At the time of this review, Vonage has fewer than 20 advertised products from Yealink and Poly. While there’s a decent selection, no pricing is disclosed online. Instead, you have to contact sales for more details.
You can download Vonage’s apps to use your smartphone, laptop, or desktop. You may also be able to use any VoIP equipment you already own, provided it is session initiated protocol capable.
It’s disappointing to have so little information (such as pricing, financing options, etc.) disclosed by Vonage. For this reason, we had to lower its score in this category to 3.6/5.
Vonage Features
Vonage has a solid selection of features. Unfortunately, some of the features you would expect to come with your plan are add-ons, further driving up the cost of your monthly bill.
Compared to its competitors, Vonage isn’t the most robust in terms of features. Businesses with multiple locations or larger businesses may not find everything they need with Vonage. However, businesses that want a dependable VoIP system that isn’t overly complicated may find exactly what they’re looking for.
You can add to your system with one of Vonage’s many third-party integrations and add-ons, but this can get quite expensive.
Overall, we rate Vonage 4/5 for its features, which we’ll detail below.
Basic Features
Vonage has the basic features you’d expect from your business phone system, including:
- Call blocking
- Call forwarding
- Call hold
- Three-way calling
- Visual voicemail
- Call queues
- Call waiting
- Click-to-dial one-click calling
- Caller ID
- Do Not Disturb
- Call hold music
- Spam shield
- Number porting
- International phone numbers
- Local business numbers (add-on)
- Toll-free numbers (add-on)
Advanced Features
- Busy lamp field
- Virtual receptionist
- Receptionist console
- Smart numbers
- Call announce
- Call parking
- Call rerouting
- Call screening
- Call tagging
- Call recording
- Voicemail to email
- Shared line appearance
- Simultaneous ring
- Secondary line appearance (add-on)
- Virtual extensions (add-on)
Unified Communications
- Admin portal for managing phone systems from anywhere
- Real-time dashboard
- Mobile apps for Android & iOS
- SMS & MMS messaging
- Contacts
- Vonage Meetings for up to 200 participants
- Team messaging & chat (add-on)
- Conference bridge (add-on)
- IP phone paging (add-on)
- Paperless fax (add-on)
- Virtual mailbox (add-on)
Reporting & Analytics
Vonage offers reports that can provide everything from company summaries to call logs for every employee. Report options include:
- Detailed call logs
- Call quality reports
- Scheduled reports
Integrations
One area where Vonage really shines is with its integrations. You can access over 100 integrations through the Marketplace, with options available for:
- Call centers
- Customer engagement
- Marketing
- Collaboration
Examples of available integrations and add-ons include:
- G Suite
- HubSpot
- Salesforce
- NetSuite
- Microsoft 365
- Microsoft Teams
- Vonage Call Monitoring
- Zoho
- Zapier
Vonage Security
Vonage has plenty of security measures in place to ensure your privacy. The company uses encryption to protect data, uses firewalls and logical access control to protect its servers from unauthorized access, and minimizes the logging of sensitive data.
Vonage also holds compliance certifications for ISO 27001, the Cloud Security Alliance Security, Trust, and Assurance Registry, PCI-DSS, HIPAA, HITRUST, and more.
Vonage boasts a 99.999% uptime, providing customers with reliable, stable service.
Given the measures that Vonage takes to ensure security and compliance, we gave them a score of 5/5 for security.
Vonage Customer Service
Vonage offers several methods for getting in touch but noticeably lacks a few options.
Vonage Support |
Availability |
Phone Support |
|
Email Support |
|
Support Tickets |
|
Live Chat |
|
Dedicated Support Representative |
|
Knowledge Base or Help Center |
|
Videos & Tutorials |
|
Company Blog |
|
Social Media |
|
Phone support is available seven days a week, although it is a bit disappointing that this isn’t available 24 hours a day. Users can submit a support ticket to get assistance. Unfortunately, there is no email support or live chat option.
Vonage does offer several additional resources, including a help center, how-tos, videos, and a company blog. A community forum is also available for sharing tips and tricks with other subscribers. Vonage also maintains social media profiles on Facebook, X/Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube.
One of the areas where Vonage falls short is the quality of its customer support. While its self-service options are great, there are numerous reviews regarding the quality of support from customer service reps.
Some users have complained that it is difficult to reach a rep by phone. Others have stated that representatives are not always helpful. Still others have said that the quality of customer service has declined in recent months.
Taking all of this into account, we’ve rated Vonage a 3.6/5 for its customer support.
Vonage User Reviews
Vonage has a generally positive reputation with users, with hundreds of reviews across the internet. Vonage is rated 4.3/5 (based on 450+ reviews) on G2, 4.1/5 (based on 300+ reviews) on GetApp, and a shockingly low 1.1/5 (based on 2,400+ reviews) on Consumer Affairs.
We pored through these reviews and found that while many people were pleased with Vonage, there were several common complaints. Based on these scores and the quality of the reviews, we gave Vonage a rating of 3.6/5 for this category.
Negative Reviews & Complaints
Although many complaints are positive, Vonage hasn’t escaped the criticism of some of its users. Users were most displeased with:
- Poor customer support
- Continuing to get billed after canceling service
- Difficulties getting service set up
- Problems with SMS messaging
- Excessive fees
- Paying for features that are free with other providers
Positive Reviews & Testimonials
Though it isn’t without its flaws, many customers are still pleased with the service they receive from Vonage. Customers praise the company for:
- A phone system that’s ideal for small businesses
- User-friendly interface
- Good mobile apps
- No additional equipment required
- Large number of integrations
- Easy-to-use features
Final Verdict: Is Vonage Worth It?
Overall, Vonage is a solid choice for business VoIP. It has the basic features you need, it works with any device, the mobile apps work well, and it’s pretty easy to get up and running. We also like that there are numerous integrations to customize your phone system,
However, Vonage is more expensive than some other options out there. This is especially true when you consider that some features, such as call recording, are only available as add-ons with additional monthly fees.
We also found that the equipment options were a bit lacking, and it’s a little disappointing to see that pricing for VoIP phones isn’t disclosed up front.
While customer reviews are overall favorable, there are some criticisms of Vonage — especially when it comes to customer support. While there are many great self-support options, it’s difficult to reach a rep … and when you do, you may or may not get the answers you need.
Overall, we give Vonage four out of five stars. It’s a good option for smaller businesses that are looking for a basic business phone system. If you’re a larger business that needs advanced features, add-ons, and integrations, just know that it’s going to cost you if you go with Vonage.
Still comparison shopping? Start with the best VoIP business phone systems to see other options that may be a better fit.