RingCentral Video vs Workplace comparison: Which should you choose?

Group of people using RingCentral Video during video meeting

The rise of smart communications software has made remote working so much simpler, connecting co-workers in locations around the world.

It’s also made it possible for organizations to reduce their reliance on email, as instant messaging apps and video conferencing enable team collaboration in real time.

There’s a whole bunch of messaging and collaboration apps to choose from, some offering more features than others. Two popular options are RingCentral Video, and Workplace from Facebook – but which is better? Our team has done the research for you, to find out how the apps measure up on the things that matter.

Firstly, let’s take a quick look at what they both do.

What does RingCentral Video do?

RingCentral Video by RingCentral is a unified communications system, incorporating collaboration tools, team messaging, and a phone system. It’s parent company, RingCentral, is a leading cloud communications platform, meaning users can be sure they’ll get high-quality performance.

Plenty of communication software promises to deliver the functionalities of different software categories in one single app, but the truth is that many of them will charge you for premium features.

Luckily, RingCentral Video offers a free plan (RingCentral Video Pro) with a raft of functions including built-in task management, unlimited file storage, and HD-quality voice and video calls. Not to mention that it benefits from multiple CRM integrations and link ups with other handy tools, too. There’s also a more advanced plan (RingCentral Video Pro+) available for $11.99 a month, providing analytics, an increased participant limit in video chats, and more.

Watch a video on how you can meet smarter using RingCentral Video

What does Workplace do?

Workplace is part of social networking giant Facebook, which means many employees will already be familiar with the look and feel of the interface. It also shares some functionality with Facebook, such as sharing data, joining groups, live video streaming, and setting up events. Of course, this familiarity with Facebook might be off-putting to those who like to keep their work and social lives separate.

This digital workplace used to offer a free plan, but a recent overhaul means there are now just two paid tiers available (unless you’re an educational or non-profit organization). The Advanced plan is $4/month, while the Enterprise plan is $8/month. Workplace does offer a 30-day trial of its Advanced level.

With these overviews in mind, let’s see how the apps can help your team communicate and collaborate effectively on the following core points:

Team messaging
Calls and conferencing
Managing projects
Storing files
Keeping you secure
Integrating with other tools

Key features of RingCentral Video

Team messaging

RingCentral Video’s built-in messaging feature supports unlimited users and realtime chat with groups or individuals, ensuring everyone is in the loop. It’s also possible to go straight from messaging to video calling in a single click.

You can create threaded conversations for specific projects, and add unlimited guest RingCentral Video users from outside your company. Admins may choose whether a team chat is public or invitation only, and maintain control over who’s posting. All of which amounts to better cooperation and a lot less inbox management!

Useful team communication tools include:

Tagging colleagues
Favoriting important messages
Keyboard shortcuts
Emojis and GIFs

or use RingCentral’s APIs to customize the app to suit your organization.

Calls and conferencing

The free plan allows up to 100 participants in a single conference call lasting up to 24 hours, as well as one-on-one video and audio calls. All calls are in high-definition, and can be recorded and ten hours saved to the cloud for up to seven days. The Pro+ plan increases this limit to 200 participants, and the call recording limit to 100 hours for a year.

RingCentral Video’s screen sharing function is included in the free version, so users can share files, give presentations, and even add on-screen annotations. Plus, you’ll find built-in security features like meeting passwords and host controls. Meetings can be scheduled by sending a link, an instant message, or a message through Outlook or Gmail.

To help online meetings run as smoothly as possible, RingCentral Video lets you reduce background noise and add closed captioning and virtual backgrounds. You can switch between devices with the desktop app or mobile app.

Managing projects

Project management is a breeze with RingCentral Video, which boasts an integrated task management feature and built-in team calendars to streamline your workflow.

Even with the free plan, it’s easy to create, assign, and manage tasks all in one place. You can attach relevant files and notes, send and receive messages, and set deadlines. You can even turn any message into a task!

As well as assigning tasks, you can keep control of the project with time tracking and calendar management tools. Assign each team member a different color, move tasks around with drag and drop, or filter them by various criteria.

You won’t even have to create multiple calendar entries for recurring tasks, as RingCentral Video uses automation to do it for you. And it’s easy to start a video chat or a new message from the same thread where you created the task.

With all these tools in one place, there’s no need for other project management software – although RingCentral Video will integrate with apps like Asana, Jira or Trello to merge updates and notifications. You can link with CRM software, too, to make it easier to keep customers and clients updated with your projects’ progress.

An employee asking for inputs on an image she shared on RingCentral Video

Storing files

Now that most offices are paperless, safe storage of digital documents is more important than ever – and RingCentral Video gives you unlimited document storage (and file sharing) for free.

No matter what size or format your file is, you can store it on RingCentral Video and share it with your team. Plus, the app integrates seamlessly with other collaboration software like Google Drive and Dropbox, so all your files are together.

A particularly useful feature is the ability to add notes or comments on any file uploaded to RingCentral Video without altering the original version. You can annotate images, too, which is a real bonus for companies who use a lot of visual material, or are handling a content management system. Document management is stress-free, since files can be organized by project or team so they’re easy to find.

Keeping you secure

RingCentral Video’s security features are top-notch, with SOC-2 compliance and TLS encryption. Enterprise-level security protects all your meetings and conversations, while hosts can demand a password for meetings and control who can join.

The app’s carrier-grade infrastructure promises 99.999% uptime, meaning the software also has a very low risk of failure. If something does go wrong, the Pro+ plan also includes 24/7 customer support via phone or live chat.

Integrating with other tools

RingCentral Video offers hundreds of integrations with other communication tools and project management software, including Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace where you can meet with one click.

The Zapier network also works with RingCentral Video, offering integrations even with chat apps, help desk software, and management tools that are not supported natively. And you’ve also got access to the API platform to create custom integrations with your company’s own tools.

An administrator is managing file sharing options in RingCentral Video

Key features of Workplace

Team messaging

Workplace’s Chat feature is a bit like Facebook Messenger, but for business messaging. It lets you direct message up to 250 co-workers at once, although you have to be a member of a group to start a conversation, making contact management a little less intuitive.

In Chat, you can:

Tag people with @mentions
Use emojis, stickers and GIFs
Send voice clips
Run polls.

Chat is also presented as a separate app which you’ll need to download, in the same way that Messenger and Facebook are separate. While it’s easily available on Android, iOS, Windows PC and Mac, it can be inconvenient to have your real-time messaging in a separate location to everything else.

A team conversation in Workplace team messaging feature

Calls and conferencing

If you’ve downloaded Workplace Chat, you’ll be able to make voice calls with one person or a group from the same app. Video calls are also available (but not everywhere, so double-check when you select your country), and it’s necessary to download a Google Chrome extension in order to share your screen.

Those wishing to host video meetings with up to 50 people can use Workplace Rooms, in which it’s possible to do screen shares and lock the room. However, this entails downloading another app and is currently in beta, so not available on all Workplace communities.

Workplace does allow you to stream live videos to a group or the whole company, broadcast with multiple hosts, and create premium events straight from your computer.

Managing projects

Here’s where RingCentral Video really takes the win over Workplace, and one thing that means it gets a greater overall rating as a collaboration tool. Whereas RingCentral Video is great on collaboration and productivity as well as internal communication, Workplace is best used solely as a communication tool.

Even though you’re paying for the app, it only gives you limited workflow management options – for example, there’s no built-in team calendar, and not much in the way of task assigning or tracking. This means you’ll have to integrate (and probably pay for) another project management tool.

Storing files

Workplace is strong on integration, and this includes third-party file storage providers. You’ll get almost-unlimited storage and access to files created elsewhere, but the downside is that there’s no search functionality for documents uploaded in this way.

While RingCentral Video lets you store files of any size, Workplace has a maximum size of 50 MB – which could hinder companies who need to keep large images on file, for instance. File sharing via Workplace Chat is capped at 75 MB. It also has a knowledge base option, best suited for static, unchanging content like holiday policies or software guides. Not ideal, then, for dynamic, ever-changing content that you might generate through ongoing projects or partner programs.

The knowledge base feature of Workplace by Facebook

Keeping you secure

Facebook hasn’t always had the best reputation for taking care of customer data – and although there’s no overlap between Workplace accounts and personal Facebook accounts, some businesses might think twice about being associated with what is primarily a social media company.

However, Workplace offers security features such as single sign-on, two-factor authentication, and SOC-2 compliance.

Integrating with other tools

Workplace has a comprehensive directory of integrations, including Microsoft Office, BlueJeans, G Suite, Salesforce, OneDrive, and Quip, and there are APIs for custom integrations.

Which team collaboration software comes out on top?

If your primary concern is pricing, then RingCentral Video is ideal – the free plan includes so many neat features that small businesses should find it meets all their needs. And large organizations still have the option of upgrading to the paid tier. If your company uses RingCentral MVP, RingCentral Video is already part of the deal. It’s a great way to improve user satisfaction and employee experience without having to spend much.

Workplace by Facebook, on the other hand, wants you to pay for even the most basic functions. But it doesn’t offer some of the things you’d expect to see, such as integrated task management – and having to download separate apps and plug-ins makes the experience less smooth.

Here are some areas where Workplace lags behind RingCentral Video:

Features comparison between RingCentral Video vs. Workplace's free plan
	RingCentral Video (free)	Workplace (cheapest tier $4)
Video calls	100 people (built-in)	50 people (separate Rooms app)
Team messaging	Built-in	Separate Chat app
Screen sharing	Yes	Yes, with extension
File storage	Unlimited	1 TB
File annotation	Yes	Yes, but only on desktop
Task management	Built-in	Third-party integrations

As far as collaboration tools go, Workplace just doesn’t seem like value for money. Our advice is to do your research and check out all the RingCentral Video alternatives, and we think you’ll agree that RingCentral Video is the cream of the crop.

To Find out more about RingCentral Video, see demos or contact the sales team