Beyond Skype: five Apps You Didn’t Know You Dreamed

When Microsoft bought Skype some years ago, disgruntled users—with questions about security, account access, and call quality—went in search of alternatives to the uber-affordable phone-and-video conferencing service. Turns out there are slew of applications from which to choose, and we’ll demonstrate you some that suggest free and low-cost calling as well as movie calls and screen sharing.

When considering an alternative to Skype it helps to very first identify how you actually use Skype. If you use it to make free calls to landlines and mobile phones, you’ll find alternative applications for that. You can also fine good alternatives for screen sharing, movie conferencing and texting. Some of these applications may require that your contacts use the same application, while others do not. Some require you to sign up using a cell phone, which also acts as your id.

Five Skype Alternatives for Puny Business

1. Google, Google Hangouts and Google Voice

Google offers a range of instruments that, when combined, make a good replacement for Skype. Google Hangouts lets up to ten participants share movie flows, share their computer screens and also talk at the same time. All you need to participate in a Google Hangout is a Gmail account or a Google Plus account.

Google Hangouts are free group movie conferences which can include screen sharing.

Google applications support Windows, Mac and Linux, and the Google Plus app for Android and iOS users gives access to hangouts on mobile devices. Google has the benefit of being fairly well received, so it’s likely that most people you contact have Google IDs and will be fairly well versed in using Google Hangouts.

Google Voice provides an alternative for free and low-cost calling, but it also acts as a unified system for managing both incoming and outgoing phone calls. Calls to the U.S. and Canada are—for the most part—free, and international calls are fairly inexpensive. The gotcha for Google Voice is that it is available only in the US and—to use it—you need a mobile phone with a U.S. phone number. Google Voice also offers free text messages from both its Web and mobile applications, and replies to these messages can be sent both to your phone and to your email address.

At its simplest Google offers free calls from inwards Gmail – just click the handset icon and dial.

If you simply want to make free domestic phone calls, then you can call a landline or cell phone from inwards Gmail—just look for the handset icon on the left side of the screen. Click it, type the number, and then click to dial it. It’s all seamless, and it doesn’t require anything more your Gmail account and, in most cases, it is free.

Two. OoVoo

OoVoo is a popular movie talk application that permits up to twelve participants to come in a free conference call accomplish with movie. The ad-supported application is available for Mac, Windows, iPhone, Amazon Fire Phone, and Android. OoVoo provides many handy add-ons including call recording, picture messaging and screen sharing. In addition it integrates with Facebook so you can invite friends to OoVoo by posting an invitation on your Facebook wall.

OoVoo’s free, ad-supported movie talk application supports up to twelve people at a time.

For conferences that you want to share, Oovoo provides a built-in feature for uploading recorded sessions to YouTube. You can make cheap calls to landlines and mobile phones using OoVoo credits, and you can upgrade to a Premium plan to eliminate the ads from movie calls and text messages at your end of the connection People who connect with you would need their own premium plan to liquidate ads at their end of the conversation.

Three. Viber

Viber an ad-free instant messaging and VoIP application for brainy phones, supports a range of devices including Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android, Blackberry and Windows Phone. To use Viber on a desktop you must very first install Viber on a cell phone; your phone number acts as your Viber identity.

You need a mobile phone to use Viber’s free VoIP and messaging application.

Use Viber to make free voice calls and movie calls worldwide but, like Skype, both the calling and the receiving parties must have Viber installed on their devices to communicate for free. If you use an iPhone or an Android device, you can use Viber Out to call any landline or mobile anywhere in the world for a petite fee.

Four. Jitsi

Fans of open source software will appreciate Jitsi—a secure java application for making audio calls and movie talks as well as for sharing desktops. Jitsi lets you record and encrypt calls, as well as communicate via instant messaging.

An open source app with an emphasis on security, Jitsi offers audio and movie talks, as well as messaging.

Jitsi also supports a large number of talk protocols, which lets you talk with users via applications such as Google Talk, Facebook, MSN, AIM, Yahoo Messenger, ICQ and more. Jitsi is available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android.

Five. WhatsApp

WhatsApp Messenger is a free, cross-platform SMS service that supports iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Windows phone and Nokia. The service uses the phone’s data plan to send messages which can include photos, movies and recorded voice messages. Like Viber, WhatsApp uses your phone number as your private ID.

WhatsApp lets you send free text messages and fasten photos, movies, and brief recordings.

If you want to pull the cork on Skype, these five apps provide mostly free domestic calls and inexpensive international calls from your desktop or mobile, as well as messaging, conferencing and screen-sharing.

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