Making Free Calls with VoIP
If you have an Android or an iOS smartphone, you can make use of VoIP apps for making free calls through the phone. However, you might be wondering which service or app is the best, as there are many available for Android, iOS, BlackBerry and Windows Phones. It is well-known that Skype is one of the most popular VoIP application followed by Viber. It is most likely that most of your friends have one or even both installed on their devices.
Both Viber and Skype can help you make free calls over the Internet or through your data connection. However, they serve different purposes and work differently, so you can actually install both of these apps on your phone.
Ease of Use of the Apps
Both Skype and Viber are very user-friendly and simple to install, though they work differently. Skype needs users to make use of their username and their password, whereas Viber does not ask you for a user name. Viber makes use of your mobile phone number as the identification. Viber is very handy to use on your smartphone, as it easily brings in all your contacts into the application, offering better mobile integration when compared to Skype. Skype was initially created for the desktop, so it took a while to be available for the mobile platform. Viber is a newer application, but it was started specifically for mobile devices. Recently, however, Viber has also launched a desktop version of the app. Hence, if you are a mobile user, Viber would be the way to go, as your mobile phone number isn’t your home number on your PC. However, if you communicate a lot through your PC, Skype would be a better choice.
Cost of Calls
Viber is a free application; so all calls and messages sent through the app to other users of the app are free and unlimited. In the same way, Skype also offers free audio and video calls to contacts that have downloaded the application. However, you can make paid calls to landlines and to other mobile phones that do not have the application as well through paid calls in Skype, at very reasonable rates.
When considering the cost of VoIP calls, mobile VoIP is more expensive than desktop VoIP, as mobile connectivity is costlier, especially when you are using data connection and not a Wi Fi connection. You need a 3G or a 4G data plan and will be billed on the basis of the megabytes used. Viber uses up 250 KB per minute of calling, while Skype is much costlier. However, Skype offers better call quality, but it is a data hog and consumes more data, making it costlier to make calls while on the go or through your mobile device.
User Base and Popularity
Though both the apps are technically good, Skype is more popular and has a wider user base. This increases the chances of the person having more number of his contacts using the app and thus saves them money, in case of Skype. The number of users using Skype is five times more than the number of those using Viber. Of course, one reason for this is that Viber is comparatively new when compared to Skype and the situation could change within a few years.
Greater Mobility
Most modern communication is done when one is on the go. In this aspect, Viber is the winner, as it was created for the mobile platform. Of course, Skype is also available for mobile phones, but it was not basically created for the mobile platform.
As far as call quality is concerned, the quality of Skype calls is much better than that of Viber, for both voice calls and video calls. The reason for this is that Skype makes use of enhanced codecs along with HD voice. The video-calling feature of Viber is also still in the beta stage, so the quality is not too good.
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