Best Web Conferencing Software in 2024

Good web conferencing tools help companies to conduct meetings with employees in different locations. This can help to reduce travel expenses and participants can join in from anywhere using a smartphone or tablet. Efficient collaboration leads to stronger teams and faster speeds in online marketing campaigns and products. This buyer’s guide provides you with useful pointers on what factors to consider as you shortlist for the best web conferencing tools for enterprises and SMBs.

We recommend you sign up for the free trial plans or demo offered by leading web conferencing software providers. This will help you to test drive the main features of each software at no cost and also do a comparison of the different platforms. To start, you can register for the free trials of 8×8 VoiP Phone Service reviews,  HipChat and Zoho Meeting which have received high SmartScore rankings and user satisfaction rating in our web conferencing software reviews, and see whether some of them are the best web conferencing software tools for your company.

• Companies that have offices in multiple locations can use web conferencing software for online meetings, which can help them save on travel costs.
• Small businesses, medium-sized companies, and large enterprises can use the software to connect their employees in diverse locations as well as for meetings with customers.
• Some web conferencing tools offer unified communications solutions that are ideal for companies running a call center business.

• 8×8 VoIP Phone Service: 8×8 hosted VoIP phone service offers advanced capabilities such as web conferencing, smartphone integration, and internet faxing.  
• Join.me: Join.me is a cloud-based app for small business and large enterprises that enables people and companies to meet online in an instant.
• HipChat: HipChat is a communications application that offers features such as private and group chat, screen sharing, file sharing, and video calling, among others.
• ClickMeeting: ClickMeeting is a great app for collaboration and communication for companies that have employees in remote locations.
• Zoho Meeting: Zoho Meeting allows companies to conduct online meetings efficiently and reduce travel costs.

The different types of web conferencing software tools can be categorized based on how they are used:

• Simple online meetings – These systems can be used to conduct simple online meeting using screen-sharing and audio features.
• Large-scale webcasting – These systems can be used to webcast to a huge online audience
• Enterprise collaboration – These can be used by midsize and large organizations for project collaboration across distances.
• Education and training – These apps can be used to train and educate people remotely via the internet.
• Rich media sharing – Multimedia users can use this type as it is optimized for running rich media apps.
• Customer support – This system can be used by organizations to provide customer support.
• Remote access – You can remotely access another person’s computer for troubleshooting and other purposes.

Following is the list of main features of web conferencing software:

Does it Offer Mobile Support?

Today, employees are not limited to merely working in the office. They travel to other places, visit customers and vendors, have lunch with other team members, etc. The vendor should offer mobile support to enable your employees to collaborate and connect from anywhere. The web conferencing software should allow access from a laptop, desktop computer, tablet, and smartphone.

Buy a Cost-Effective ‘All-in-One’ Solution

You would be wasting money and time shopping for different solutions for web conferencing, video conferencing, teleconferencing, etc. It will turn out to be more expensive and could become a hassle if you are to use the different apps separately. Go for a vendor who offers all these services in one cost-effective package. Make sure the package contains all the features you need for effective web conferencing.

Ease of Use

Even popular web conferencing software apps can be a bit difficult to use. You may need to take multiple steps to join a meeting. Plus, the software can make it hard to perform screen-sharing with another user without giving them full control. Many services offer the same features but work differently. We recommend you sign up for the free trials of top web conferencing apps and test drive their features to understand how easy they are to use in the real world.

Video Quality

Most corporate communication is non-verbal and text-based, which means there are no social cues to help you understand better. For effective video conferencing, make sure the solution provides high quality video. This will enable you to view the facial emotions and hand gestures of participants in face-to-face video meetings. Top web conferencing software focus on the person who is currently speaking, which will enable you to catch social cues.

Flexible Audio Features

The software should offer flexible audio features to enable participants to join and contribute from anywhere. Normally for audio conferencing, you can dial in with a phone or utilize your computer’s audio. These options make it simple for your employees to participate from their desks or on the go. So, make sure the solution includes audio conferencing with useful options and features.

Call Recording Tools

The software should not only allow you to host conferences and make calls but also give you the option to record them. This makes it easy for managers to review conversations later on. Alternatively, those who use these web conferencing tools to stream seminars can easily archive their lectures for future use.

How do you Plan to Use the Software?

Be clear about how you plan to use the web conferencing application now and in the future. Apart from team meetings, you can use it to interview customers to ask about improvements, train employees in various off-site offices and those who work from home, host webinars to answer the questions posed by your prospects, etc. Once you are clear about your present and future requirements, you can go about the process of selecting a suitable software for your needs.

Streaming and Recording

It is standard to record web conferences to be used for different purposes. Some apps only provide proprietary recording formats, making it difficult for you to play and share the recordings. So, make sure you can record your web meetings in standard MPEG 4 audio and MP4 video formats. Opt for a cloud-based software that does not levy any charge for storage of recordings. Another important point is to ensure the web conferencing software supports video and audio streaming.

Integration with Calendar

This point adds to the ease of use factor. The web conferencing software should smoothly integrate with popular calendar apps to enable you to easily send meeting invites. You should be able to schedule meetings and create calendar invites that you can share with participants. The invites should contain all essential information, including phone numbers.

Customizable Meeting Rooms and Screens

You should be able to customize the meeting room and screen, depending on the type of meeting. For instance, you might want to use full screen video, or a gallery view to show a PowerPoint presentation to participants. So, make sure the software offers different views and makes it easy for you to customize meeting rooms and screens.

The following trends have been observed in the growth of web conferencing software:

Mobile Deployment. Web conferencing solutions deployed on mobile is much easier to use and a lot cheaper. Convenience and ease of use drive more people to use web conferencing on their mobile phones, leading to greater flexibility and agility in the way people connect to online meetings.

Collaboration Options. Conferencing and collaboration have an emerging symbiotic relationship. Web conferencing solutions now deliver a wide variety of options that allows users to do more than just conferencing. You can typically find file sharing features, team messaging tools, mark-up functionalities, and other capabilities that allow end-users to work together seamlessly.

High-Quality Visuals. People now have higher expectations of video, multi-media and communication technology. So they will less likely to have the patience for buffering visuals. But thanks to technological advancements, software developers were able to deliver solutions with high definition video and audio tools.

Some of the problems that you might have to experience and address when using web conferencing tools are as follows:

Network/Bandwidth Issues. Lack of bandwidth and poor network connection is a common problem encountered during online meetings or webinars. Unless you have a stable internet connection, individuals may encounter screen sharing failures, video feed freezing, unexplained delays, and more. This can result in a poor conference experience.

Device compatibility. Employees may use different devices, such as personal computers, tablets, smartphones, and laptops in joining a web conference. Not all web conferencing solutions support a variety of devices and this could be a problem. If the tool does not integrate well with the devices being used by the team, they may end up abandoning it altogether.

Non-verbal cues. Non-verbal cues should be well-known in order to better understand the other individual’s intended information. Web conferencing limits what the participant can see or hear. This could easily result in misunderstandings.

We hope this article has given you a good grounding on the basic factors and features to look for in web conferencing software. Be clear about your needs, try out the free trials of a few good web conferencing solutions, do informed comparisons, and zero in on the right tool for your business.