Unified Communications Cage Match: Teams vs. Zoom
Unified Communications Cage Match:
Teams vs. Zoom
Live from a computer network near you, the top 2 contenders in the Unified Communications space square are off in a battle of the ages. In the left corner, the reigning heavyweight champion: Microsoft Teams. In the right corner, the scrappy underdog that rose from the ashes of COVID: Zoom.
If you are wondering which one of these two UCaaS UCaaS platforms is best, read on as we go toe to toe in this faceoff of End User Experience, System Administration, Integrations, Video, Voice Calling, and Price. Both platforms are full featured across the board. Each can handle video meetings, internal and external chat, SMS text messaging, VoIP voice calling, & calendar out of the box, with Zoom integrating directly with O365 for email and calendar.
Round 1: End User Experience
Teams and Zoom have similar capabilities, but the ways in which they are accessed are vastly different. Due to Microsoft integrations, more tabs and settings menus can be difficult to navigate within Teams. Microsoft has changed the location of some settings in the past making it more challenging to stay on top of things. Generally speaking, Microsoft is more difficult for the novice user, but once you get the hang of the layout, the controls are accessible.
On the other hand, Zoom is incredibly easy to navigate. The home screen is less cluttered, all settings are available in a single menu interface, and the features across the top menu bar are more simplistic vs. the Microsoft sidebar layout. Interestingly enough Zoom has brought in Outlook email and calendar integration into the Zoom app, so you don’t have to leave Zoom for any type of communication internal or external. Outlook isn’t integrated with full visibility into Teams yet, so this positions Zoom as the true unified communications platform.
Round 1 Winner – Zoom
Round 2: System Administration
From an administrative standpoint, there is user administration for user-specific settings as well as the back-end full system administration, typically used by management and network administrators. Fortunately for both platforms, most of these global configurations should be “set-it and forget-it.” For large enterprises with a full IT staff, Teams administration can be simple because the Microsoft knowledge base is contained in-house. If you are a smaller business outsourcing your IT, you should consider having some discussions with your managed IT services provider about how to best deploy the features and capabilities of Teams within your organization as well as what settings and permissions should be applied at each job role. Setting up Microsoft Voice features is especially challenging for novice users.
On the contrary, Zoom’s administration interface is a breath of fresh air. Administrators at any IT skill level should find their interface intuitive and easy to use. This is especially important in the small business arena where Zoom Phone may be deployed, and user admins may make more frequent changes. The permissions needed to administer Zoom are not at the same network level as needed to administer Teams so security risks are less in the Zoom administration portal. AD integration is available which can pull in user profiles as with Teams speeding up deployment in large organizations.
Round 2 Winner – Zoom
Round 3: Integrations
In addition to their native functionality, Microsoft can pull in nearly all of its O365 productivity suite into Teams, and provides files directly linked into OneDrive. Microsoft Power BI will allow your organization to mine data from Teams that could be useful to spot trends or problems. At the time of writing, Microsoft has 1900+ apps that will integrate into Teams. Zoom has 1500+ apps that integrate into its platform, including most major CRMs, but the big hole here currently is Salesforce. When considering which solution is right for your organization, you would be well served to look through their published list of integrations (available for free on both platforms).
Round 3 Winner - Microsoft
Round 4: Video
Both Teams and Zoom perform well with video, but our experience is that Zoom had fewer issues with video quality and glitches vs. Teams earlier on, but that seems to have equalized over time. Microsoft Teams has unlimited video calling out of the box with your basic Microsoft license whereas Zoom requires a separate paid license for video calls longer than 30 minutes. Modifying video settings is also more intuitive with Zoom vs. Teams, making the experience better. Zoom is better equipped to handle large meetings with increased participation limits for webinars along with more advanced webinar capabilities. Zoom also can host a multi-event/day conference remotely, a feature that sprung out of COVID but may be getting less use now that we are back to traveling.
Round 4 Winner - Zoom
Round 5: Voice
Both platforms will allow voice calling with the right interface and licensing. This voice integration also includes SMS messaging on both platforms. The differences between them come with the features available. Zoom has better call routing and auto attendant/IVR capabilities, live call transcription, more advanced hunt & ring group capabilities, and a host of other features not yet available in Teams. Zoom supports a wide array of devices, including ATAs for legacy fax machines that are still used heavily in the medical and legal verticals. The administration of Zoom’s portal is very easy, even for the novice. Zoom also has full omnichannel contact center capabilities with voice, email, webchat, SMS, and social media queuing for agents.
Round 5 Winner - Zoom
Round 6: Price
It would be natural to assume that Microsoft would win out here, after all, Teams is included with the most basic Microsoft licensing. Unfortunately, it becomes a little more granular here and businesses really need to peel back the layers on the capabilities that we discussed previously to get a good feel for what the true costs are. For the sake of conversation here, we will compare a full featured deployment of both platforms that include voice calling and SMS messaging which would make both a true Unified Communications Solution. The pricing scenario below is current as of the publication of this blog.
Microsoft’s licensing can be very confusing, and we could have a separate conversation working on this configuration alone. Business Standard is the entry license point here at $12.50/month. An E3 license is $23/month and other licensing that can be used as a baseline, including Business Premium, fall in between. You would need to add a Teams Phone license to these base licenses for $8.00/month to have access to the phone features (unless you have an E5 license which includes phone), and then a calling plan needs to be layered on top of any licensing for another $2-$8 per month. Calling plans vary and are metered so heavy users may rack up additional usage charges. All in, you are in the $24.50 - $44.00/month per user. Most businesses will likely fall in the mid-upper $30’s/user/month all-in with VoIP calling in Teams.
Zoom’s licensing is simple and straight forward. Zoom Business Plus license delivers the full host of Zoom features, including Zoom Phone calling & SMS for $25/month. It can rightfully be argued that businesses that are Microsoft or Google shops will still need to add-in basic licensing so let’s add a Business Standard license at $12.50/month and we are in the upper $30’s with Zoom.
Winner Round 6 – Tie
And the Winner is:
Our experience selling and integrating both platforms is this: Currently Zoom is the true Unified Communications solution because of its ability to integrate with email, thereby bringing all business communications into one single pane of glass (email, internal chat, SMS, voice, & video). If you are looking for more advanced calling features as part of your platform, along with easier administration and a better user experience, Zoom is the clear winner.
If you are a Microsoft house with strong admin capabilities on retainer, have basic calling needs, and the desire for more powerful integrations into other software tools and Microsoft products, then Teams is the clear winner. Microsoft’s ecosystem is vast and continues to grow, and we anticipate additional enhancements from AI as Copilot becomes more interwoven into Microsoft’s applications.
While it might appear on the surface that Zoom wins this one based on the individual round scores, that isn’t always the case, and your business should weigh the most important factors in its consideration of which technology to deploy. If you would like to learn more about adding voice to Teams, deploying either these products in your environment, or get some advice from our VCIO services on deployment strategy and how they might improve efficiency and communications in your business, Contact TCI NOW or give us a call today.
