Google Voice pricing, plans, & hidden fees

Thinking about purchasing a Google Voice plan? It’s less straightforward than you might’ve imagined.

As a legacy VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) platform established in 2009, Google Voice serves business owners and personal users. This is where the confusion comes in — there are four separate price plans, not to mention hidden costs and subscription fees.

This guide provides everything you need to know about Google Voice pricing, including its plans, fees, and required subscriptions. It also provides a better alternative for small business owners who need an affordable VoIP service.

Breaking down Google Voice for Business pricing and plans

How much does it cost to buy Google Voice for Business?

Let’s break it down in the chart below:

	Starter	Standard	Premier
Pricing	$10 per user per month	$20 per user per month	$30 per user per month
Maximum number of users	10	Unlimited (but extra for more than 50)	Unlimited (but extra for more than 50)
Ring groups	X	✔	✔
Multi-level auto attendant	X	✔	✔
Ad-hoc user call recording	X	✔	Automatic
BigQuery exports	X	X	✔
SIP Link	X	✔	✔
eDiscovery	X	✔	✔

Keep reading to get a closer look at each plan, including some Google Voice pros and cons.

Starter plan

Google Voice’s Starter plan costs $10 per user per month. With it, you can get a Google Voice number and make unlimited calls to the US (as long as you’re also located in the US or Canada).

You’ll also get the following features:

• Call forwarding
• Activity reporting
• Voicemail transcriptions
• Unlimited text messaging (US only)
• Web and mobile apps
• Integrations with Google Calendar and Google Meet

Notice the Starter plan doesn’t offer auto-attendants and ring groups, which makes it harder to route customers to the right department or team member. And speaking of team members, you can only have up to 10 on this plan. You’ll have to upgrade if you manage a bigger team.

Want to record calls for quality assurance or agent training? You can’t do that without upgrading to the Standard plan. And if you want automatic recording for any of your calls, you’ll have to upgrade again to the Premier plan.

Standard plan

The Standard plan is double the price of the Starter plan at $20 per user per month. The good news is you’ll no longer have a 10-user cap. The bad news is you won’t get many additional features.

The ones you do get include:

• Ring groups
• Multi-level auto attendants
• Desk phone support
• eDiscovery
• Manual call recording

As a reminder, you won’t have automatic call recording on this plan. You will, however, get desk phone and SIP link support.

Keep in mind location restrictions apply — Google Voice doesn’t support international locations unless you upgrade to the Premier plan.

Premier plan

The Premier plan is Google Voice’s most expensive plan, weighing in at three times the cost of the Starter plan ($30 per user per month).

You get two additional features for your extra $10 per user per month:

• Advanced reporting (BigQuery)
• Automatic call recording

Feeling underwhelmed? You’re in good company. Google Voice offers bare-bones features at the cost of a more advanced plan.

And no matter how much you upgrade Google Voice, there will always be features it’s missing. This includes shared numbers, a desktop app, toll-free numbers, and more

Google Voice’s hidden fees you need to know

If you’re still keen on buying a Google Voice plan, you should know there are other costs to consider.

Be prepared to pay for:

• Google Workspace: Every Google Voice plan requires a Google Workspace subscription. Prices start at $6 per user per month, but if you want better features (like 5 TB of pooled storage per user), be prepared to pay $18 per user per month.
• Porting fees: It’s not free to port a number to Google Voice. If you’re porting to the free plan with a Verizon, Google Fi, or AT&T number, you’llpay $20. If you migrate your free number to a Google Voice for Business plan, you have to pay a $3 unlocking fee and purchase a temporary carrier plan.
• Calls to Canada from non-Canadian and US numbers: With Google Voice, you can only call US numbers with other US numbers. Calls to Canada from a US number are subject to international fees.This isn’t presented on the website, however — you’ll have to contact sales to get a straight answer.

Not a fan of unnecessary fees? This is a common gripe with Google Voice. It’s also why business owners migrate to Google Voice alternatives that offer better features at more affordable prices.

Key differences between Google Voice personal vs. business plans and pricing

By now, you’re familiar with Google Voice for Business — but how does it compare to Google Voice for personal use?

For starters, this is a free plan designed for personal users. This means it isn’t designed for businesses or available outside the US.

Here’s a quick breakdown of a couple of other important differences:

• Google Voice for Google Workspace is designed for business owners and comes with features like ring groups, voice transcriptions, and business hours. With Google Voice for personal use, the most significant features you get are caller ID, call forwarding, and unlimited domestic voice calls (in the US only).
• To use Google Voice for Google Workspace, you need an active Google Workspace subscription (starting at $6 per user per month). You don’t need this subscription with Google Voice for personal use, but be prepared to pay number-unlocking or porting fees. 

Check out this brief chart comparing Google Voice’s business vs personal plans:

	Google Voice for Business	Google Voice for Personal
Available outside the US	✓	X
Multiple phone numbers	✓	X
SMS and MMS	US only	Personal use only
Unlimited calls in the US and Canada	US and Canadian numbers only	X
Maximum number of users	10 to unlimited	1
Price	Starts at $16 per user per month (including Google Workspace)	Starts at $0 per user per month
Porting fees	Free	$20 to port in and $3 to port out
Ring groups	Requires upgrade	X
Integrations	Google apps only	X
Separate business and personal contacts	✓	X
Voicemail transcripts	✓	✓

OpenPhone: The better alternative to Google Voice

Google Voice isn’t a bad option for personal users or solopreneurs. But if you’re looking to streamline business communications, it simply won’t be enough.

That’s just one of many reasons why former Google Voice users migrate to OpenPhone — the #1 business phone solution as rated by G2. 

Here are five ways OpenPhone measures up against Google Voice:

1. Share incoming calls and texts with your team

Google Voice doesn’t make it easy to collaborate in context. But with OpenPhone as your VoIP service provider, you can keep everyone on your team working on the same page.

With shared numbers, for example, you don’t have to worry about missing incoming calls. Everyone on your team will receive incoming calls with simultaneous ring, and you can customize your ring order to specify which team members tackle incoming calls based on their availability.

Incoming texts come into a shared inbox all your team members can access. Shared inboxes reduce your response times and help you answer customer questions faster. 

Finally, OpenPhone’s automatic call recording and call summaries and transcripts help your team gather context on customer conversations faster. There’s no need to manually review your calls anymore, which means your team will always be on the same page.

2. Get the numbers your business needs

Google Voice for personal use offers one phone number per account. Google Voice for Business isn’t much better since you only get one phone number per account (and no toll-free numbers at all).

OpenPhone lets you have as many phone numbers as your team needs. Each user in your OpenPhone workspace is assigned a unique number. Choose from local US or Canadian numbers, North American toll-free numbers, or your own vanity number. Unlike other VoIP providers, we don’t charge you extra for toll-free number minutes you use for calls to your US and Canadian numbers. 

Need even more numbers? Additional numbers cost $5 per number per month. 

3. Save time communicating with your contacts

Customers aren’t just calling your business — they’re also sending texts and leaving voice messages. But Google Voice doesn’t make this easy to manage since all calls, texts, and voice messages live in separate folders.

OpenPhone’s shared inboxes let you view all your interactions with your contacts in one place. You don’t have to jump to different views to find out what customers have told you.

Your team can save even more time using OpenPhone’s advanced messaging features. Respond to customers after business hours with auto-replies, answer common questions with snippets (text templates), and schedule messages to customers based on their timezone. 

Google Voice doesn’t offer any advanced messaging features, which forces your team to manually respond to customers whenever they receive a message.  

How to get a virtual phone number with OpenPhone

Getting a new phone number with OpenPhone as your virtual phone number provider is faster, quicker, and more cost-effective than Google Voice. Follow these three steps to get started:

• Create an account with OpenPhone (when you sign up, you get a free, seven-day trial).
• During signup, choose your city or area code in the US to select your preferred phone number.
• Once the signup process is complete, you’re all set to use your new virtual phone number!

4. Put repetitive work on autopilot

Want to put more time back into your day? This won’t be easy with Google Voice. Even on the Premier plan ($30 per user per month), Google Voice doesn’t offer integrations with non-Google tools.

OpenPhone’s Starter plan ($15 per user per month) offers essential integrations you can use to connect OpenPhone with your tech stack, like your Slack workspace. And with our Zapier integration, you can share your call data with 7,000+ apps. Plus, if your team has a developer, you can plug into webhooks to send alerts with an HTTP request.

When you’re ready to upgrade to OpenPhone’s Business plan, you can access CRM integrations like HubSpot and Salesforce. Log calls, texts, voicemails, and recordings automatically so you can spend more time building relationships with customers. 

5. Avoid hidden fees

Google Voice’s pricing comes with lots of hidden fees. It costs extra to port, there are fees for calling Canadian customers with a US number, and you’ll have to pay extra for Google Workspace every month.

With OpenPhone, you’ll know ahead of time how much you’re paying since we share all costs on our pricing page. It’s also 100% free to port your number.

Switch from Google Voice to OpenPhone

Should you pay for Google Voice?

That’s something only you can answer.

But if you’re not a fan of limited features, hidden fees, and expensive subscriptions, the answer may be ‘no’ for your growing small business.

If you’re looking for a reliable, collaborative, and easy-to-manage VoIP platform, you might want to try OpenPhone. All you need is a smartphone or a computer and an internet connection. Get started today with our seven-day free trial.