Alternatives to Zoom
Zoom alternatives worth switching to
Google Meet is the easiest swap if your organisation already has Google accounts; Jitsi Meet is the one to use when you want no accounts and no vendor at all. Whereby gives you a permanent room link you can just send, and BigBlueButton is purpose-built for teaching. Zoom's advantage remains reliability on poor connections and in large meetings.
Pricing verified 2026-07-28 · we re-check quarterly ·
how we compare
Why people leave Zoom
- Time limits on the free tier cutting meetings short
- Paying per host for people who host occasionally
- Requiring participants to install an application
- Wanting meetings on infrastructure the organisation controls
The alternatives
1 
Best for: Anyone with a Google account already
Pricing: Free tier with a time limit on group calls; longer meetings come with Workspace. source
Strengths
- Everyone with a Google account already has it
- Runs in the browser, nothing to install
- Calendar integration is seamless
- Solid free tier for one-to-one calls
Trade-offs
- Group calls on the free tier are time-limited
- Fewer webinar features
- Best experience assumes Google accounts
Verdict: The lowest-friction switch for most organisations, and usually already paid for inside Workspace.
2 
Best for: Meetings with no account and no vendor
Pricing: Free and open source. Use the public instance or host your own. source
Strengths
- No account required for anyone
- Free and open source
- Self-hostable for full control
- Genuinely no time limit when self-hosted
Trade-offs
- Public instance quality varies with load
- Fewer polish features
- Self-hosting needs real bandwidth
Verdict: The best answer to "just send me a link" — and the only one here with no vendor relationship at all.
3 
Best for: A permanent room link you just send
Pricing: Free tier for one room, paid tiers for more rooms and longer calls. source
Strengths
- A permanent room URL you reuse
- Browser-only, nothing to install
- Simple, clean interface for guests
Trade-offs
- Free tier limited to one room
- Fewer large-meeting features
- Smaller participant caps
Verdict: Excellent for client calls, where a recognisable fixed link and no install is worth more than features.
4 
Best for: Teaching, specifically
Pricing: Free and open source, built for virtual classrooms; hosting is your cost. source
Strengths
- Built for teaching: whiteboard, breakouts, polls
- Open source and self-hostable
- Deep LMS integrations
Trade-offs
- Overkill for ordinary business meetings
- Needs proper hosting to perform well
Verdict: The specialist. If you run classes rather than meetings, it beats all of these including Zoom.
Don't switch if…
- You run large webinars where reliability matters more than the licence fee
- Participants join from poor connections — Zoom still degrades more gracefully than most
- You depend on its recording, transcription and breakout tooling
- Your clients expect Zoom and friction on their side costs you more than the subscription
We say this on every page. A comparison that never recommends staying put is an
advert, not a comparison.
Questions people actually ask
Who is Zoom's biggest competitor?
Microsoft Teams by installed base, since it is bundled with Microsoft 365, and Google Meet for organisations on Workspace. Both win largely on bundling rather than on the meeting experience itself.
Does anybody use Zoom anymore?
Yes — widely, especially for external meetings, webinars and education. What changed is that Teams and Meet absorbed a lot of internal meetings because companies already pay for them.
Is there a cheaper version of Zoom?
If you already pay for Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, you effectively have a meeting tool included. Jitsi Meet is free outright. Zoom's own free tier is capable but time-limits group calls.
What is the best free meeting platform?
Jitsi Meet for no accounts and no time limits, particularly self-hosted. Google Meet if everyone has a Google account. Both are genuinely free rather than trial-limited.