8x8 X Series review
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to traditional phone lines, letting users make voice calls over an internet connection.
Since you don’t need the cable infrastructure, it’s easier to set up and can be more cost-effective to run. In 2024, it's well worth finding the best VoIP service for your business, no matter the scale.
Due to the large number of providers out there, working out which VoIP provider is the right one can be difficult. 8x8 is a popular provider that offers several different All-in-One Communications plans under the banner 8x8 X Series. (The service was formerly known as Virtual Office Pro.)
In this 8x8 All-in-One Communications review, we assess the pricing, features, interface, support, and security offered by this VoIP service.
Every company has its own needs – sometimes very specific needs – and so we recommend checking out our reviews of RingCentral, GoToConnect, Zoom, Aircall, and the best VoIP services to make the absolute right decision.
8x8 X Series: Plans and Pricing
We have to be upfront here: assessing the pricing for 8x8's suite is difficult as the tiers are available only upon request. What we do know is how much these plans, or at least similar plans, cost prior to this update, as detailed in previous reviews.
Starting off, 8x8 offers five tiers: X2, X4, X6, X7, and X8. As you can imagine, each of these adds on something to the prior tiers, from X2 to X8, and many of these upgrades are applicable to larger organisations.
In past reviews, the price of the X2 plan was $28/user/month, the X4 was $57/user/month, the X6 was $112/user/month, the X7 was $131/user/month, and the X8 was $170/user/month. While 8x8 is unlikely to have changed these levels too drastically, it's worth checking with them based on your specific needs.
Some of the core considerations will be whether your business needs to make international calls, whether you need video conferencing, internet fax, and so on. We'll get into the features in more detail below.
As with most companies on our radar – but not all – there are savings to be had if you’re willing to pay for one year upfront. The exact saving depends on which plan you’re considering and where you are in the world, but they’re mostly somewhere between 14% and 24%, which is can be a nice discount.
8x8 X Series: Features
The call options offered by 8x8 are more than just the standard VoIP calls.
The X Series enables high-definition audio and video conferencing with up to 100 participants, and there are multiple moderation controls available, including host delegation and participant lobbies.
8x8 has also added the ability to record the audio, video, and chat, to be published to the cloud for those who missed the meeting.
A large amount of cloud analytics data is efficiently collected on 8x8's single platform, enabling easy access and analysis. The dashboards are updated in real time and can be customized to your liking.
With detailed data like speech analyses of every call, you can identify employee and customer trends and interpret them to solve problems and increase efficiency.
Besides making calls from 8x8’s own app, you can integrate the service into other apps and software that your employees may already use, such as Microsoft Teams, Salesforce, Google Workspace, and Slack. This makes your processes more efficient and reduces the time that employees need to spend learning new software.
Larger companies will value the extra features that come with the higher-level X tiers, like hot desking, wider call handling capabilities, and 30-day UC meeting and call storage.
8x8 X Series: User interface
The setup process for 8x8 X Series is simple and it only takes a few minutes to provide the basic information about your business needed to get going. 8x8 is available via the web dashboard, iOS and Android apps, and desktop apps.
We found all the interfaces to be well designed for efficient use, and there isn't too much of a learning curve. The main app for employees is called Work and has a simple layout that makes navigation easy. It functions as a central hub from which you can access voice calls, video calls, text messaging, meetings, and more.
The browser-based dashboards for supervisor use are more complex but have a wide range of functions, including analytics and switchboard control.
Overall, we were impressed with 8x8, and the apps have clearly been designed with ease-of-use in mind, while containing powerful features.
8x8 X Series: Support
If you run into problems when setting up or running your 8x8 X Series system, there are various support options available, starting with an AI assistant, which will direct you to articles on the knowledge base relevant to your question.
If the chatbots don’t help, you can contact technical support via text chat, ticket, or phone. However, the live assisted support is only available to those on the more expensive plans.
The quality of tech support does seem to be variable – many customers have complained that communication has been poor, or that problems have been passed on from phone call to email. There are plenty of positive reviews to counter this, though, so it’s likely that 8x8 is no different to other companies.
Plus, now that pricing is available on application, a direct link with 8x8 is much easier to establish, so this is unlikely to be an issue for most.
8x8 X Series: Security
For businesses that handles financial information or other confidential customer data, it’s crucial to know that your systems are secure, and 8x8 excels in this respect, offering multiple security measures and transparency regarding them.
Communications are fully encrypted using Transport Layer Security (TLS) and Secure Real-time Transport Protocol (SRTP), so you can be sure messages and calls aren’t being intercepted. Secure coding practices are used to ensure that the technology is safe, and fraud detection tools are also built in.
We like additional steps that end users can take to protect their own data, and 8x8 delivers in this respect, too, with two-factor authentication (2FA).
8x8 X Series: The competition
The VoIP market is strong right now, with lots of offerings that cater to the specific needs of any company, large or small.
One popular choice is Dialpad, which has prices beginning at $15 per user per month when paid annually. It has an impressive range of features and like 8x8, has comprehensive security and decent video conferencing performance.
Another option is RingCentral MVP (formerly known as RingCentral Office). This is more expensive, starting at $19.99 per user per month, but it comes with a suite of advanced features and integrations with numerous CRM programs and other software, including some pretty impactful AI-driven features like call monitoring.
We'd also recommend checking out GoToConnect, Vonage, Aircall, and Zoom, to make sure your business makes the right choice.
8x8 X Series: Final verdict
There’s not much to fault with the 8x8 X Series.
The app combines multiple methods of communication into one efficient workspace, and there are multiple useful features, such as analytics, integration with other software, and video conferencing.
As if that wasn't enough, the security features are among the best on the market.
One downside is that the quality of tech support seems to be a little lower than its rivals. However, the pricing is competitive, with plenty of features packed into one of the more affordable VoIP packages out there.
While the basic 8x8 plans includes all main features, the increased support options and international calling make the more pricey plans the most likely choice for most small and medium businesses. If you’re looking for a comprehensive and reliable VoIP provider, we recommend signing up for a trial with 8x8.
