Cisco Webex: The Expertise of a Pioneer and the Reliability of a Leader

Webex was founded in 1995 by Subrah Iyar and Min Zhu. Zoom’s founder, Eric Yuan, was an engineer at Webex before launching his own multi-billion dollar company. A former Zoom president, Dave Berman, was also president of global sales and services at Webex and even helped take it public. With so many experts working within the company, it’s no surprise that it became both successful and influential in the field of sales enablement and especially in video conferencing.

What is Cisco Webex?

Cisco Webex is a cloud-based productivity suite that keeps teams connected. Including Webex Teams, Webex Meetings, and Webex Devices, this suite merges Cisco’s web conferencing platform and the Spark team collaboration tool.

With video meetings, file sharing, and team messaging, the suite enables unified communications for all businesses, from small companies to multinationals. With Webex, all meetings within a company can be managed through Cisco Webex Meetings or Webex Teams apps.

What does Webex offer?

Webex offers a wide range of services to users—so many that it can be overwhelming. Here are the main offerings to give you a clearer idea of Webex’s capabilities.

1. Videoconferencing

Webex Meetings is the company’s flagship product and has been a top choice for video conferencing for years. Beyond HD video, screen sharing, and meeting recording, you’ll also find it very easy to join—or even host—conferences on the go with the Webex app.

2. Webinars

Webex Events lets you host webinars with up to 3,000 participants. Essential features like polls, Q&A, and text chat are fully supported, letting you get the most out of every session. Webinar tools include a whiteboard, content sharing, and screen sharing to keep everyone on the same page.

3. Training

Webex Training makes training easier than ever worldwide. Presenters can share presentations, instruct via a digital whiteboard, and even record sessions to build a resource library. The app also features e-commerce functionality so you can charge for your training.

4. Remote Support

Webex Support is one of the most robust remote support solutions on the market, helping you cut operational costs, resolve issues faster, and provide real-time service to anyone worldwide. Webex lets you support any client with an internet connection, regardless of time zone, via chat or video conferencing.

5. Collaboration

Webex Teams may not be as popular as some other collaboration apps like Basecamp or Trello, but it’s still a solid choice. You can easily schedule meetings, host online meetings via chat, use whiteboards, and share files—all in one software. There’s no better user interface for joining meetings with a single click.

6. Cloud Calling

Webex Calling provides the essential features you expect from an effective cloud-based solution. Hold, dial, resume, transfer, and do-not-disturb are all supported. You can also use the virtual receptionist to greet callers.

Enhance your video conferences

Webex Mobile Capabilities

A great thing about Webex is that it’s just as easy to use on the go thanks to mobile apps available on both the App Store and Google Play. The iOS version has over 50,000 reviews and supports Siri.

The Android version, however, is even more popular with over 200,000 reviews. It averages 4.4 stars compared to 4.3 on iOS. No matter your phone’s operating system, Webex smartphone apps ensure you’re never late to a meeting, even when you’re away. You can even use them with smartwatches like the Apple Watch.

Webex Plans and Pricing

Webex has long been known for its affordability. A closer look will help you choose the right plan for your business. You can pick from four distinct plans if you decide to use Webex.

Free

One of the main advantages of Webex is that it comes with a fully functional free plan. To be clear, it’s completely free—not just a trial you can use for a limited time. Without paying a cent, you can host up to 50 participants on your video calls without sacrificing video quality. You’ll also get 1 GB of cloud storage with the free plan—space that other providers usually reserve for premium members on higher tiers. The only limitation with the free plan is that your meetings are capped at 40 minutes. This shouldn’t be a problem if you’re hosting fairly short conferences.

Basic

The cheapest paid plan and a great choice for managing a small business or compact team. It costs $15/month per user, but there are some unique perks that make it worthwhile. It can be easily deployed for any business size as a precursor to a more robust plan.

You won’t have to worry about long meetings hitting the cap since your new limit will be set at 24 hours. That’s practically unlimited, as it’s extremely rare for a video conference to last that long.

Your cloud storage also gets a nice upgrade, reaching 5 GB. You’ll also be able to generate transcripts when recording meetings, making it easier to review all topics discussed in a specific conference.

Finally, upgrading to this plan unlocks integrations and plug-ins, giving you access to all the apps that can be used with Webex. Webex is designed to work with Microsoft Teams, integrating with Microsoft Outlook, PowerPoint, Skype, and other productivity tools used on-site or remotely.

Business

Most medium-sized teams opt for the "Business" tier of Webex, as it doubles participant capacity from 50 to 100, making it easy to keep everyone informed with a single conference rather than covering the same topics multiple times.

If you choose this plan, you can also set up custom URLs that make it easier for team members to join a conference.

24/7 customer support is available for users at this level, which can be helpful if you run into issues organizing meetings. It’s a bit pricier at $30/month per user, but the cost is justified if your team needs extra capacity.

Enterprise

The most expensive tier Webex users can choose. While it’s not ideal for every business size, there are situations where the premium features and add-ons are very useful. Pricing is custom.

There’s also a minimum of five licenses per month. If you don’t meet the criteria, you can’t use the plan. That’s because it’s designed specifically for large teams.

Scale is the main draw of this tier, as you can host conferences with up to 200 participants and get 10 GB of storage. You’ll also access various features exclusive to users at this level.

Whatever plan you intend to choose, we highly recommend starting with the 30-day free trial so you can evaluate Webex’s features before spending your money.