The 8 best RingCentral alternatives for small businesses and enterprises

Whether you’re on the lookout for a regular phone system or a robust and innovative enterprise phone system), it’s no secret to you that being able to communicate with teammates, customers, prospective leads, and more is crucial. It’s essential you make the best decision. .

For many companies looking for a VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) business phone system / contact centre software / unified communications platform, RingCentral is one name that pops up frequently.

If you’re not sold on it yet (totally fair) and want to look at alternatives to RingCentral first, keep reading for a detailed breakdown of how it stacks up against eight of the best platforms out there for businesses.

RingCentral’s strengths and drawbacks: A quick note

Here’s the thing. RingCentral has been around for 20 years, so they must be doing something right. You might even decide, after reading this post, that you want to choose them—and that’s cool. But there are certain areas where, in our humble opinion, other providers score better.

For example, RingCentral does offer some feature-rich plans, with things like team messaging, call management, and video conferencing. But companies on smaller budgets may find it a little pricey, especially as not all users get functionality like call recording, real-time voice transcription, or Salesforce integration as standard. (These do come included with some other providers, as you’ll see in a bit.)

RingCentral’s Essentials plan (£12.99 user/month, for two to 20 users and 100 toll-free minutes) includes team messaging and file sharing, but things like unlimited audio conferencing and unlimited virtual fax, are limited to higher tiers.¹

Here’s how we evaluated these RingCentral alternatives for UK businesses

To put this list together, we considered the aspects that matter most to business owners and employees, and used this criteria to assess each solution:

Features

Aside from price, this is probably the first thing you’ll want to hear about. All the providers we researched offer a range of features, but in most cases, the level of business phone services and functionality you get will depend on the pricing band you choose.

(Extra points for having business must-haves like auto-attendant, business text messaging, and voicemail included in the basic plan. Which Dialpad does have, by the way.)

Customer support

Let’s face it, some unified communications platforms are better at customer support than others. If your business operates internationally, you’ll probably need 24/5 or even 24/7 support globally. If you’re looking at RingCentral UK alternatives, support is a must-have, so bear in mind some providers only have US-based support or limited hours.

It's also not uncommon for companies with a heavy focus on enterprise customers to "tier" their customer support. (Which means that if your business represents only a few hundred or thousand dollars a month in revenue, or unless you're Lloyds Banking Group or Tesco, you'll likely be just a number in their eyes.) So make sure you read the reviews for RingCentral and all of these alternatives' customer support!

Cost-efficiency

We won’t tell you that pricing is an important consideration or “you get what you pay for” since that’s a given, but we will say that it’s best to consider the total cost of ownership, no matter which RingCentral alternative you’re looking at.

In other words, don’t just look at the initial price tag! Beyond the overall price per plan, we evaluated these options based on things like whether you have to pay extra for add-on features, per-minute calling rates locally and internationally, and setup or onboarding fees (which you might not hear about until you’re deep in the sales process).

Call quality

Whether it’s for professionalism or just being able to talk to your teammates on a daily basis, call quality is huge for businesses that are looking for a phone system. It’s no use getting a cheap business phone system that charges you a couple of pounds a month if the call quality is so bad that you can’t get through a conversation properly—and there’s no faster way to ruin your NPS score or customer satisfaction.

Ease of use

These solutions are meant to make hybrid and remote work easier for your employees, not harder. And yes, they should pick up the slack for your IT team and be easy to administer. So, we took into consideration the time it takes to get up and running, the intuitiveness of the mobile and desktop apps, and how easy it is to do things like porting your number.

We also checked out how scalable the platform is—a crucial but underrated factor for growing businesses.

Integrations

Unified communications are all about, well, keeping your communication channels in one place and consolidating data as much as you can. One interesting thing about RingCentral is that even though it bills itself as an integrated UC (unified communications) + CC (contact centre / call centre) platform, it’s actually reselling another company’s contact centre platform.² (Specifically, NICE CXone—while these two companies comarket, they operate as two completely separate entities.)

Just something to consider, as this usually means different account logins and user interfaces or experiences between your contact centre and unified communications platform.

What makes it a great RingCentral alternative?

And finally, as well as the overall functionality of each solution, we’ll also look at how it compares directly with RingCentral.

The 8 best RingCentral office alternatives for small businesses and enterprises

1. Dialpad: A truly unified communications platform with powerful AI technology

Dialpad is a cloud-based unified communications system, promising unbeatable reliability (100% uptime for enterprise customers) thanks to worldwide data centres and 24/7 global support.

Because it’s built on the Google Cloud Platform, Dialpad offers excellent security and reliability, and also excellent call quality. (This was something that was really important for Bing Lee, which has over 40 locations and needs good call quality at all of them.)

Not only does Dialpad give you video meetings, messaging, and phone calls all in one business phone app…

It also has a cloud contact centre platform that—uniquely among all of these RingCentral alternatives—has the same aesthetic and user experience as the UC side. You can use your web browser without needing to download anything. That also goes for contact centre agents, who can work from anywhere just like your average office worker.

Dialpad also has built-in analytics to make life easier for managers and supervisors. For example, there are heat maps that show call volume and average speed of answer:

But the biggest differentiator for businesses is Dialpad’s built-in AI technology. Not only does it transcribe meetings and calls in real time:

It can also recognise and track keywords and phrases—which, for example, means that Sales and Support teams can track how frequently competitor names and features or issues come up on calls with customers and prospects:

But that’s not all. To take this one step further, Dialpad can also trigger Real-time Assist (RTA) cards automatically when keywords or phrases are spoken on calls. These are essentially customisable cheat sheets that can help agents and reps with tricky topics as they’re talking to customers. For example, if your Sales team gets lots of questions about pricing, you can create an RTA card with pricing notes and set it to pop up when “price” or “pricing” is said on a call:

What makes Dialpad a good alternative to RingCentral?

RingCentral, like many long-established business phone services, is built on older telephony architecture—whereas Dialpad is built on a unique split cloud architecture that is more modern and flexible.

Not only that, both Dialpad’s unified communications and contact centre platforms are built and supported in-house (not the case for RingCentral’s contact centre solution, which is white-labelled or sold on behalf of another company).

Generally, it also takes longer to set up a new user on RingCentral (more, if you’re starting an entire contact centre)—we encourage you to try the free trial and see for yourself what the process is like. With Dialpad, you can add new users easily yourself and set up local phone numbers for them in seconds:

RingCentral does have more integrations, but Dialpad’s app marketplace is growing every day, and its open API makes it possible for you to build custom integrations with whatever tools your team is using. (Plus, Dialpad integrations are available to all users, not just contact centre agents.)

As of right now, Dialpad has integrations with popular software like Salesforce, Microsoft Teams, and more.

Pricing

• Standard: £12 per user per monthUnlimited calling, call controls, voicemail transcription, Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 integrations, custom off-hours routing, multi-level auto attendant, a free local VoIP number, toll-free number support, and more

• Pro: £20 per user per monthEverything in the Standard plan plus hold queues, a wider range of integrations including Salesforce and Outreach, 24/7 phone and chat support, and more

• Enterprise: Everything in Pro plus service level agreements and custom retention policies

2. 8x8: An established name in the communications space

8x8 is a well-established phone system provider that has been around a long time. They offer a single platform for cloud contact centres as well as audio, video, and text messaging. There are plenty of integrations available and you can try their basic package out for a 30-day trial.

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

8x8 has some impressive security features such as multi-factor authentication, encryption, and fraud detection. It also holds many compliant certificates, so you know your service is secure. If you’re looking for a well-respected industry heavy weight this could be the option for you. Just bear in mind that its telephony infrastructure tends to be outdated, which can result in poor call quality and reliability.

Pricing

• Express plan (Basic): £10 per month per user. Includes basic features such as team messaging and voicemail for up to five users.

• The X Series X2 plan (Pro) costs £25 per month per user. Unlimited users and features such as CRM integrations, 24/7 customer support, video transcription, and hot desking.

• The X Series X4 plan costs £47 per month per user. All of the features of the X2 plan but with extras like call barging, 8x8 Frontdesk, and unlimited calls to 48 countries.³

3. Vonage: Good call quality and flexible routing

Vonage is a cloud-based VoIP service with a mobile and desktop app. Out of all these RingCentral alternatives, Vonage is probably the most “a-la-carte” focused, meaning the plans themselves come with very little functionality included in comparison, and everything can be added for a fee.

It doesn’t have its own built-in video conferencing software, but uses a third party, Amazon Chime Pro Tier, instead. It does have team messaging, where everyone with the app can start or join group chats, share files, and participate in video and voice calls.

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

If you’re looking for flexibility, then RingCentral’s plans aren’t quite as customisable as Vonage’s scheme—without the ability to pick and choose, you may end up paying for features you don’t even need.

When it comes to toll-free numbers, RingCentral does have more—but the downside is that it doesn’t test them as extensively as Vonage (so we’ll call that a draw). Vonage wins out on customer IT support—though it costs extra—with the Vonage Support PLUS add-on to help with hardware installation, virus removal, and third-party integrations.

Pricing

• Select: £9 per line per month. 10p/minute calls to UK landlines and mobile, call forwarding and call transfer, access to Vonage meetings.

• Professional: £12.50 per line per month. Everything in Select, plus unlimited UK landline minutes, virtual receptionist, on-demand call recording, and international options.

• Ultimate: £16.50 per line per month. Unlimited UK landline and mobile minutes, company-wide recording and an integration suite.⁴

4. GoToConnect: An affordable option

For small teams and freelancers who need straightforward and affordable cloud communications, GoToConnect offers simple setup and pricing, plus enough features to get you up and running.

Formerly known as Jive, it’s now part of LogMeIn, which now houses all the GoTo products. GoToConnect combines Jive’s original cloud phone system with GoToMeeting’s video and audio conferencing solution for a unified package.

Tools include auto attendant, mobile apps, call forwarding, virtual voicemail, and ring groups—and they’re all simple to set up and make changes to.

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

GoToConnect rates well online for customer service, with phone support, email, and tickets, plus customer support content like data sheets, user guides, FAQs, and videos. It even has a helpful community for crowdsourcing answers to questions.

The pricing scheme is also attractive in comparison to what you might get charged at RingCentral.

Pricing

• Basic: £10 per user per month (for 20 or fewer users)Unlimited extensions, call forwarding, auto-attendant, video meetings for up to 40 people

• Standard: £21 per user per monthCall recording, real-time analytics, video conferencing for up to 150 users, international calls to 50+ countries

• Premium: £44 per user per monthCall analytics, monitoring, barging, video meetings for up to 250 users, 5,000 toll-free minutes⁵

5. Intermedia: Stable software uptime

Intermedia’s big sell is that it promises 99.999% uptime (did we mention Dialpad promises 100% for enterprise customers?), with a financially-backed service level agreement.

It simplifies things by having just two pricing plans, and both have a range of features including voicemail transcription, auto-attendant, caller ID, and customisable hold music.

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

The pricing plans are simple to understand, and the cheaper one—Unite Pro—allows for 100 participants in video conferences and 200 in audio. That’s way ahead of RingCentral, although it’s worth noting that the cheaper option is almost twice as expensive as Dialpad’s least expensive plan. Pro also includes pretty much all of RingCentral’s features (apart from real-time supervisor functions like whisper and barge).

Intermedia also offers 24/7 customer support, but they don’t say online whether it’s US-only or worldwide.

Pricing

• Unite Pro: £20.99per user per month. 10GB of file backup, sync and sharing

• Unite Enterprise: £24.99 per user per month. 200 participants in audio and video conferences, supervisor functions⁶

7. Nuacom: A simplified option

Nuacom is a VoIP provider that offers features such as call tags, do-not-disturb, and click-to-call. However, unlike Dialpad it isn’t a UCaaS platform. So, you don’t have access to messaging or video conferencing on any of their price plans.

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

If you’re looking for a simple and easy to understand VoIP service provider Nuacom is a potential option. Also, its basic service, though slightly more expensive RingCentral, does come with more features.

Pricing

• Essentials plan: £14.99 per user per month. This includes CRM integration, IVR with auto-attendant, and automated call recording.

• Unlimited plan: £29.99 per user per month. Offers all the features of the Essentials plan alongside live call coaching, advanced call reporting, and call queues.⁷

8. bOnline: Designed for (super) small businesses

This virtual phone system is another well-known RingCentral UK alternative, although it’s aimed specifically at smaller businesses that are looking for affordability over functionality.

bOnline does have unlimited inbound calls, voicemail, and call forwarding on every plan, but there’s no video conferencing on the starter option and, if you want to integrate with CRM, you’ll have to pay an additional charge.⁸

What makes it a good alternative to RingCentral?

bOnline markets itself as being for small businesses specifically, so price-wise, it may be more affordable than RingCentral. In terms of ease of use, we’d probably recommend trying out the free trial and comparing it with RingCentral’s user experience. If your business is very small or doesn’t have many communications needs, you might find that bOnline gives you enough functionality without needing to go with RingCentral since it has the basics like a desktop and mobile app and voicemail included in all plans.

Another thing is that it is incredibly easy to get started as they’re aimed at small business owners that don’t have access to an IT department for support. They also have great customer service reviews listed on third party sites.

Pricing

• Starter: £6 per user per month. Includes 100 outbound landline minutes, mobile and desktop apps, and call forwarding.

• Unlimited calling: £13.95 per user per month. Includes unlimited outbound calls to UK landlines and mobiles, on-demand call recording, and video conferencing.

• Unlimited calling: £15.50 per user per month. All of the features of the above package but this one also includes a desk phone.

Which is the best cloud-based communications solution on the market?

Choosing a VoIP provider for business communications is a tough task. It’s a very crowded market and it can be difficult to figure out the specifics of a solution until you start using it.

If you’re leaning towards a certain service provider after reading this post, we’d suggest trying it with a free trial (Dialpad lets you do this for 14 days, and you can even sign up via your Google or Microsoft 365 account).

As we mentioned earlier, there are a lot of RingCentral alternatives small businesses can consider offering very similar enterprise phone systems, so make sure you scrutinise those feature lists to see which gives you the most for your money. Compare not only the price tags for each plan, but also the features that are included in each one. For example, RingCentral's least expensive Essentials plan doesn't necessarily have everything that comes in Dialpad’s least expensive Pro tier.

We may be just a bit biased, of course, but if your business is looking for a cloud-based communications solution with robust and modern functionality—at an affordable price—then take Dialpad for a test drive.

¹ringcentral.com/office/plansandpricing_a.html#office

²channelfutures.com/telephony-uc-collaboration/ringcentral-nice-extend-partnership-to-offer-ringcentral-contact-center

³8x8.com/products/plans-and-pricing?locale=uk

⁴vonage.com/unified-communications/pricing/

⁵goto.com/pricing/connect

⁶intermedia.com/products/unite/pricing

⁷nuacom.com/prices/

⁸bonline.com/pricing