Ooma Review – The Good and Bad for 2023

With a free plan and affordable prices for more feature-rich plans, Ooma helps customers set up a complete phone system. You get the essentials, like voicemail, call forwarding, and call blocking, plus various other features to help you tailor the system to your specific needs.

We love Ooma for small to mid-size businesses lacking IT teams, especially ones that still want to use desk phones in some capacity. If that sounds like your situation, you will appreciate Ooma’s easy-to-use setup and custom phone system capabilities that can handle traditional landlines, IP phones, and mobile devices with equal aplomb. 

Read on to learn more about this leading VoIP phone service and how it stacks up against our other top VoIP systems.

Compare Ooma to the Best Business VoIP Phone Services

Ooma is one of our top picks for VoIP phone systems because of their easy-to-grasp pricing structure, ability to integrate with your existing phone equipment, and suitability for traditional office settings. Let’s take a look at our Golden Eggs, our four favorite overall solutions from our full post on the best VoIP providers and phone systems:

Nextiva is an unbeatable all-around VoIP phone service that can work well for most businesses, whether they need a platform for external communication, internal collaboration, call centers, or any combination thereof. Get started by getting a quote for your Nextiva plan today.

Ooma is the favored solution of traditional offices converting to VoIP from an old phone system, because you can keep using the phones and other equipment you have while also tapping into advanced VoIP features. Sign up for Ooma and get a free local and toll-free number.

Vonage provides a wide array of features and capabilities that you can choose from to bolster your call center and make it more efficient and effective. Get a quote from Vonage by talking to one of their experts about your needs.

RingCentral is a versatile VoIP phone system with a wide range of use cases, including remote work, international calling, and virtual phone numbers. Try it out today with a free 30-day trial.

But if any of these don’t suit your needs, these are also great choices: Zoom, Mitel, Google Voice, OpenPhone, 11Sight, Microsoft Teams, 1-Voip, 3CX, Phone.com, Dialpad, CallHippo, 8×8, GoTo Connect, Aircall.

Ooma: The Good and the Bad 

The Good 

Customer support: You likely won’t need help setting up your new phone system. But if you do, Ooma makes it easy to get in touch with a friendly and knowledgeable professional. Beyond live chat and email support, Ooma business users have a separate support number from home customers. This helps ensure you get fast help when you need it.

You won’t be directed to the same support line as hundreds of home phone users, and you won’t have to deal with long wait times or transfers to the right department. Furthermore, Ooma also has an active community forum that covers best practices, tips, inspiration, and even answers to basic questions.

Easy setup: Ooma features an out-of-the-box setup that gets everything up and running without a headache. It requires zero technical knowledge to install your Ooma phone system, and everything is fully configured upon arrival.

This auto-configuration technology detects all of the proper settings required for the system to work. In short, this simple setup allows you to skip several steps that would normally be required to install a new VoIP phone system.

Full-featured mobile app: Every Ooma plan comes with a mobile app. The mobile version really comes in handy whenever you’re on the go or away from your home or office desk computers. The mobile app is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, so it’s compatible with iPhones and Androids alike.

You make and receive calls, check your voicemail, and update your account information right from your smartphone. This is a significant advantage over other phone systems that are tied to physical desk locations or offices.

Virtual receptionist: Ooma’s Virtual Receptionist is ideal for directing calls for your business. You can set up a custom greeting, send callers to different extensions, or provide a menu of options that can guide callers to the right person. Whether you’re a solo business owner or have a multi-staff company, the Virtual Receptionist feature acts like another set of hands to help you handle calls.

Fair pricing: Lots of business phone services appear to have low entry-level pricing. But then you quickly realize that you need to purchase more expensive tiers to get what you’re really looking for. That’s not the case at all with Ooma.

With plans starting at just $19.95 per user per month, it’s a pretty good rate when you consider the fact that even the entry-level plan comes with over 50 standard features. You won’t have to pay extra for things like call forwarding, virtual extensions, call logs, virtual fax, and all of the basics.

Unlimited calling: Ooma offers unlimited calling within the US, Canada, Mexica, and Puerto Rico with any Ooma Office plan. This is a great perk if you don’t want to worry about usage restrictions or paying by the minute.

So if the vast majority of your business calls are taking place here in these regions, you won’t have to pay extra for high-volume calling.

The Bad 

Limited basic features: Ooma’s entry-level home and business packages include features that work well for many people. But to get some of the more sought-after features, you may need to upgrade to a higher tier. Features like text messaging, video conferencing, call recording, and voicemail transcription aren’t available at the lowest tier.

Wi-Fi requires add-on: If you want your system to connect to the internet wirelessly—a good idea if you don’t have hardwired hookups for each phone in your home or office—you’ll need to buy a separate Wi-Fi adapter for $49.99. Additionally, businesses may need to buy an Ooma Office Base Station to connect their phones and other devices.

No call center features: Ooma isn’t really set up for call centers. So if you have dozens of phone support agents or sales reps that are handling a high volume of inbound and outbound calls per day, you’d likely need to consider an alternative option.

No desktop app on entry-level plan: Most business users will likely have to start at the mid-tier Pro plan as well because the Essentials package does not come with the Ooma desktop app. So if you sign up for the entry-level package, you’re limited to just using Ooma from your smartphone. This isn’t ideal for traditional office environments where most users are in front of a computer all day.

Ooma Pricing and Options 

Ooma offers both residential and business VoIP phone services. Since we’ve just focused on their business-oriented features and benefits in this review, let’s zoom in on what an Ooma package for your office or organization might cost you.

Ooma Office Phone System 

Ooma segments its pricing and packages into two categories—residential and business.

Residential users can start with a 100% free plan. The only cost is for the phone system itself, plus any equipment you might need to get up and running. The free residential plan, known as Basic, offers connectivity with the mobile app, HD audio, call forwarding, and other must-haves.

For additional services like a second line, backup number, voicemail monitoring, call forwarding, and call blocking, you can upgrade to Premier—starting at $9.99 per month.

Business users have three different packages to choose from:

• Ooma Office Essentials — $19.95 per month
• Ooma Office Pro — $24.95 per month
• Ooma Office Pro Plus — $29.95 per month

All three services come standard with more than 50+ features to support business phone needs.

With the Essentials pricing tier, you receive a virtual receptionist, hold music, digital fax, and the ability to automatically send voicemails as audio attachments to your email address.

Additionally, the Essentials tier allows you to set up Ring Groups. These are groups of your team members who are eligible to answer certain types of incoming calls, such as a billing call, a tech support call, or a general customer service call. You can set up this feature so that it rings on the phones of all members of the appropriate Ring Group at the same time or so that it rings on one phone at a time for the members of the Ring Group until someone answers it.

When you jump from Essentials to Pro, you’ll get added features like the Ooma desktop application, video conferencing, call recording, call blocking, voicemail transcription, caller info match, dynamic caller ID, Google and Microsoft 365 integrations, call analytics, and more.

For an extra $5 per month, the Pro Plus plan supports Salesforce integrations, call queuing, and hot desking. That’s a no-brainer upgrade for businesses already using Salesforce. 

Ooma Residential and Business Phone Numbers

Getting a phone number through Ooma is simple, whether you’re a home or business user. Home customers can register a number when they register their Ooma Telo device. Ooma makes numbers available in almost any area code, so you can even pick a non-local number if you’d prefer. Business customers can register either a local number or a toll-free number for their business. 

Ooma also allows you to transfer your current number to your Ooma setup through porting. This is handy for businesses that already have an established customer base that uses the current phone number. You won’t need to change your marketing or update your number anywhere if you switch to Ooma from another company.

Every Ooma customer owns their phone number, allowing them to transfer their number to another provider if they switch services. Just make sure your account with Ooma is current and in good standing before attempting to port the number to a new service.

Ooma Virtual Receptionist

No automated feature can fully replace a real-life receptionist for your business, but Ooma’s Virtual Receptionist is about as close as you can get. If you’re a business owner and don’t mind relying on an automated system that directs calls to the correct department or person, then the Virtual Receptionist can save you from an extra person on your payroll.

The best part about the Virtual Receptionist feature is that you can set a schedule for when you want it to take over. Say you have a receptionist available from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Set the Virtual Receptionist to start working at 5 p.m. to direct calls even when your business is closed for the day.

Depending on the size of your business and how many departments you have, you can also set up the Virtual Receptionist as a multi-level system, fielding calls to different departments. The end result is a more efficient calling system for you and your customers.

Ooma Call Recording

Available to business customers, Ooma’s call recording feature lets you record and play back phone calls as needed to make sure you don’t miss any important details. This function is a must for capturing important information from a phone call that you’d like to be able to review later, especially if you’re on the go and don’t have the opportunity to take notes.

Choose between on-demand call recording and continuous call recording. The latter automatically records any inbound or outbound call. You may want to use this feature if your business prefers to review calls to monitor customer service. Call recording is also available for audio conferencing, allowing each participant to have a recording of the meeting for future use.

All recordings remain in your call logs in Ooma Office. From there, you can play, download, or delete them as needed.

Ooma Enhanced Call Blocking

Ooma lets home and business users stop unwanted calls through call blocking. The feature is available only on the upper tiers of each plan type—Premier and Ooma Office Pro—but is absolutely worth the cost if you dislike your phone line being tied up with spam calls.

Especially important for businesses, enhanced call blocking automatically searches through a robocall database to determine if the calls coming into your line are legit. Detected spam calls get blocked automatically instead of coming through as a ring to your phone. That means more time for productive phone calls.

You can also manually block numbers that may not get automatically detected by Ooma but are still creating a problem for your home or business. And choose whether you want your phone to ring when an anonymous caller is trying to get through. 

In other words, your blocking profile is entirely customizable, but you can also fall back on preconfigured blocking levels if you’d like. Control any settings related to call blocking via Ooma Office or the mobile app.

Ooma Video Conferencing

Use Ooma for more than just audio calls, thanks to its video conferencing capabilities. The simple interface allows a host to create a meeting within seconds through Ooma Office. Then others join by entering a meeting ID or clicking a shared link. Meetings can happen on virtually any device with Ooma’s mobile app.

If you’re on a Pro plan, you can have to 25 people can be in a meeting at one time. Pro Plus plans support up to 100 participants.

Like other leading video conferencing programs, Ooma allows participants and hosts to screen share, even simultaneously, creating a collaborative space to share information about a project. There’s also a chat feature, muting capabilities, and password protection for meetings.

One downfall of the system? There’s currently no feature for recording video conferences like you get with other services, such as Phone.com and RingCentral.

Ooma Voicemail Forwarding and Transcription

Having an intuitive and reliable voicemail system is crucial to both home and business phone users. Ooma home phone users get all the expected voicemail basics, including a customizable greeting and the ability to check voicemail remotely via the mobile app. 

There’s also voicemail forwarding for home or business users. The system sends your voicemails to your email inbox with the click of a setting. No matter where you are, you’ll be able to check your voicemail via an audio recording in your email, even if you don’t have your Ooma phone available. For people who like to check work voicemail from home, this is a clear benefit.

Take advantage of even more modern voicemail conveniences with voicemail transcription, also available for home and business plans. The feature creates a text version of your voicemail and sends it to your email. 

Basic home phone plans use automated technology for transcription. Premier users get human-assisted transcription for more accuracy. Unfortunately, there’s no option for human-assisted transcription for business plans, and only Ooma Office Pro users have the feature available.

Ooma Desktop and Mobile Apps

Ooma ensures that you can change settings and fit your phone system to your needs by making its back-end available on a range of devices. Use the desktop app or mobile app, depending on your preferences and what devices are available to you, to change settings, check voicemails, route calls, and more.

Ooma offers its desktop app to business customers only. Allow team members to access the back-end to update settings or go through their voicemail inbox. The app features a directory, allowing team members to contact one another by extension with ease. The desktop app is currently only available in Ooma Office Pro.

The Ooma mobile app is just as intuitive. Use it just like you would your Ooma phone, but through your cell phone instead. Make calls, take calls, check voicemail, and set up group chats, allowing you to stay productive, even when you’re away from your main Ooma setup.

Ooma CRM Integration

While Ooma is definitely built for small businesses, you can still get enterprise-quality benefits through its CRM integration.

If you sign up for Ooma’s Pro Plus plan, you’ll have the option to integrate your phone system into Salesforce or Microsoft Dynamics 365.

This makes it possible for your team to make calls directly from within your CRM. So you have access to all of your customer information without having to bounce back and forth between multiple screens and platforms.

In addition to simplified outbound dialing within your CRM, you’ll also see all of the customer’s contact information for inbound calls within Salesforce or Microsoft. If you don’t have the number saved, you can easily create a new contact with a single click.

These integrations go beyond basic calling features. You’ll also have the option to automate specific call tasks within the CRM record. For example, if a new call gets placed through your CRM, you can set up an automated reminder for follow-ups based on specific parameters.

For now, this is only available for Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics 365. So if you’re using another CRM software, you can’t integrate Ooma.

Ooma Hot Desking

Ooma’s hot desking capability is an advanced feature that’s only available on the Pro Plus business plan.

It’s a must-have feature for hybrid work environments and shared office spaces where employees aren’t always at the same desk or workspace.

With just a few clicks, employees can turn any Ooma desk phone into their own dedicated line.

Here’s how it works.

Users can dial *50 on any unassigned phone, followed by their extension number and voicemail PIN. Now all outgoing calls from this phone will show the appropriate caller ID, and incoming calls for that employee will ring on this device.

So if someone works from home three days per week but needs to be in the office twice a week, they can use the hot desking feature to make sure their line follows them to the office.

When that person leaves the desk, they just need to dial *51 to unassign the phone, and it’ll be ready for the next user.

Hot desking also helps reduce hardware costs, as you won’t necessarily need a phone for every single employee. You’ll just need enough phones for how many people are working simultaneously in the same space at the same time.

Ooma Digital Faxing

Unlimited faxing is included with every Ooma office plan, which is why Ooma ranks so high on our list of the best online fax services.

When you look at how other digital faxing tools are priced, you’ll quickly see the value in Ooma’s service.

Faxing is far from dead in the business world. But it’s not always practical to have a fax machine in every office or work environment, especially if lots of your employees are working from home.

But with Ooma, your team can send and receive faxes from anywhere without a physical fax machine.

Everyone on your team can have their own fax number that’s linked to their extension at no additional cost.

It’s easy to send faxes online through the user portal, and all incoming faxes will be sent as a PDF to the user’s email address.

Expanding Your Knowledge: Ooma

Comparing The Best Business VoIP Phone Services

Ooma may or may not be the right solution for your home or office, but our in-depth reviews of the best VoIP phone providers should lead you to the right one.

Ooma has plenty to offer home and business phone customers, from its customizable setup to its convenient features, like call blocking and call forwarding. Ooma Office is one of the best VoIP phone services for small businesses without an IT department to do all the setup. Its simplistic setup can get your team up, running, and understanding the system with minimal hiccups along the way.