Zoom — Video meetings, team chat, and phone in one workplace platform, from around $14/user/month billed annually.
By Noahlast updated
Zoom screenshots & video
Zoom in 20 seconds
Best for: hybrid teams that need reliable HD video meetings, phone, and chat under one login
Pricing: Free Basic plan available; paid Pro and Business plans run roughly $14-22/user/month depending on tier and billing cycle, with Enterprise custom-quoted.
- Zoom's free Basic plan allows unlimited 1:1 meetings but caps group meetings at 40 minutes and 100 participants.
- Paid Pro and Business plans are reported at roughly $14-17/user/month and $18-22/user/month respectively depending on billing cycle, per third-party pricing trackers; Zoom's own site no longer lists exact figures.
- AI Companion, Zoom's built-in meeting-summary and chapter-generation tool, is included free on all paid plans.
- Zoom Workplace holds a 4.6/5 rating from 14,659 reviews on Capterra.
- Zoom runs natively on web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, and Android.
Limitations: Zoom no longer publishes exact Pro/Business pricing on its own site, so buyers must rely on sales quotes or third-party trackers.; The free plan's 40-minute group-meeting cap forces most small teams to upgrade quickly.; Phone, webinar, and large-meeting capacity are separate paid add-ons rather than included in the base license.
Top alternatives: Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, Cisco Webex, GoTo Meeting, RingCentral — full list
What is Zoom?
Zoom is a video-first communication platform built around its core meeting product (Zoom Meetings) and expanded into a broader "Workplace" suite covering team chat, VoIP calling (Zoom Phone), whiteboards, and shared docs. It became the default video-call tool for millions of remote and hybrid teams and now positions itself as an AI-first platform: AI Companion, included free on paid plans, generates meeting summaries, smart chapters, and follow-up task suggestions inside every call. The free Basic plan supports unlimited one-on-one meetings and group meetings up to 100 participants, but group calls are capped at 40 minutes — a limit that pushes many small teams onto a paid plan quickly. Pro extends meetings to 30 hours and adds 10GB of cloud recording storage; Business adds single sign-on, managed domains, and multi-region data storage for larger organizations; Enterprise scales to 1,000 meeting participants and a full PBX phone system. Zoom Phone, Zoom Webinars, and Zoom Rooms are sold as separate add-ons on top of the base per-user license.
Zoom is a unified communication platform combining video meetings, team chat, VoIP phone, whiteboarding, and AI-generated meeting summaries, used by everyone from solo freelancers on the free Basic plan to enterprises running 1,000-participant town halls. The free Basic tier allows unlimited 1:1 calls but caps group meetings at 40 minutes; paid Pro and Business plans remove that limit and add cloud storage, SSO, and unlimited AI Companion use, with third-party pricing trackers reporting Pro near $14-17/user/month and Business near $18-22/user/month depending on billing cycle. Zoom runs on web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, and Android. Zoom Workplace holds a 4.6/5 rating from 14,659 reviews on Capterra.
Standout feature: AI Companion generates meeting summaries, smart chapters, and next-step suggestions automatically, included free on every paid plan rather than sold as a separate add-on.
Biggest weakness: Zoom's own pricing page no longer publishes exact per-tier dollar amounts for Pro and Business, pushing buyers toward sales calls or third-party trackers to get a real number, and the free Basic plan's 40-minute group-meeting cap pushes small teams to upgrade quickly.
Pros
- AI Companion (meeting summaries, smart chapters, follow-up suggestions) is included free on paid plans rather than a paid add-on.
- Consistently reliable HD video and audio even on weaker connections, thanks to adaptive bandwidth handling.
- One platform covers meetings, phone (Zoom Phone), team chat, whiteboard, and docs instead of stitching together separate tools.
- Native apps for Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, and Android, including a full Linux client many competitors skip.
Cons
- Free Basic plan limits group meetings to 40 minutes, forcing an upgrade for most recurring team calls.
- Exact Pro and Business pricing is no longer published on Zoom's own site, requiring a sales conversation or third-party source to confirm.
- Zoom Phone, large-meeting capacity, and webinar capabilities are separate paid add-ons on top of the base per-user license.
- Business Plus was folded into a bundled add-on rather than sold as its own standalone tier, complicating plan comparisons.
Zoom pricing
Free tier · paid from $14.16/mo
| Plan | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Basic | Free | Free forever; unlimited 1:1 meetings, group meetings capped at 40 minutes and 100 participants, 3 uses of most AI Companion features. |
| Pro | $14.16/mo | Per user, billed annually (reported at ~$16.99/month billed monthly); 30-hour meeting length, 100 participants, unlimited AI Companion, 10GB cloud storage. Zoom's own pricing page no longer publishes this figure directly; sourced from third-party pricing trackers. |
| Business | $18.33/mo | Per user, billed annually (reported at ~$21.99/month billed monthly); 300 participants, SSO, managed domains, multi-region cloud storage. Sourced from third-party pricing trackers, not Zoom's own published rate card. |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom quote; 1,000 meeting participants, unlimited cloud storage, full PBX phone system, 500-attendee webinars. |
What reviewers say
Scores belong to their platforms; we display them with attribution and never fold them into our own ratings.