The best video conferencing software is essential in every workforce now. It fosters seamless communication and collaboration between employees regardless of their location. It’s a must-have for companies in 2025, but choosing the right videoconferencing platform in a sea of options can be daunting.

Google Meet is one of the options you’ll likely encounter when researching videoconferencing software. It’s offered by Google, a company best known for its search engine and a host of other software tools. Google Meet is an intuitive platform that’s directly integrated with other Google apps, and it has its unique pros and cons.

I’ve thoroughly tested and reviewed Google Meet to help you decide whether it’s an ideal tool to adopt. Read on to learn about Google Meet’s features, pros, cons, and how it compares to the competition.

Google Meet: Plans and pricing

Google Meet is free for personal use, but the personal version lacks some of the features available in the paid business plans. I used the free Google Meet version to hold video calls, and it worked excellently. However, it became limiting when using it as a group.

On the free plan, group meetings are limited to a maximum of 100 participants and a 60-minute duration. Some helpful group meeting features, including recording, attendance tracking, and admin controls, aren’t available on the free plan.

The paid version of Google Meet isn’t offered as a standalone plan. Instead, it’s part of a Google Workspace plan that unlocks access to Meet and many other tools. There are three standard Workspace plans: Starter, Standard, and Plus.

The Starter plan costs $7 per user per month. Under this plan, Google Meet is restricted to 100 participants and a 60-minute meeting duration, similar to the free plan. However, it offers additional features not available on the free plan, such as live captions.

The Standard plan costs $14 per user per month. Under this plan, the maximum number of meeting participants increases to 150, and the meeting duration is extended to 24 hours. It also unlocks enhanced features, such as polling, Q&As, and meeting recordings, which are saved to Google Drive. Each account has 2 TB of storage, so there’s ample space to store recorded meetings.

The Plus plan costs $22 per user per month. Here, a maximum of 500 participants can hold video meetings for up to 24 hours. It has advanced capabilities, including attendance tracking and the ability to dial into meetings by calling a designated phone number. 

There’s an Enterprise plan with no specific pricing, but it’s best suited for companies with large workforces (500+). If you represent such a large organization, you can contact Google’s sales team to negotiate a deal.

A 14-day free trial is available for Google Workspace plans, during which you can test Meet’s features before making your final decision.

Google Meet: Features

Google Meet is designed for videoconferencing between many participants. A major appeal of Google Meet is that you don't need to download any app to use it, although a mobile app is available for convenient access. You can run Google Meet and utilize all its features on your web browser.

I enjoyed Google Meet’s intuitive interface, which made starting and managing meetings a seamless process. Unlike several other videoconferencing tools I’ve tested, new users can grasp Google Meet’s interface without needing much help.

To start a new video meeting, users can click the "New meeting" button, which is prominently displayed on the Google Meet landing page. You can create instant video meetings or schedule them for a later time.

After scheduling a meeting, you can create a unique link for other participants to join. If needed, you can set a passcode to add an extra layer of security. One of the best features I tested was the ability for participants to join meetings by dialing a phone number – Google will create a unique phone number for each meeting.

I’ve discussed the limitations of the free version, including the number of participants and meeting duration. This free version works well for personal use, but a Workspace subscription is what unlocks the full value of Google Meet and its features.

A key feature is the ability to record meetings, which is available on the Standard plan or above. Recording meetings is standard practice in many organizations, as it lets you review content for mistakes and share information with colleagues who couldn’t attend the original meeting.

Meeting recordings are saved on Google Drive, from which they can be easily accessed. With the Standard plan providing 2 TB of storage per user and the Plus plan offering 5 TB, there’s sufficient space to store many meeting recordings. However, if you run out of storage space, you can upgrade to a higher plan for additional storage or delete old recordings that are no longer useful.

I enjoyed using the polling and Q&A features, which make video meetings more interactive. As the meeting administrator, you can create polls to gauge participants’ opinions on topics related to the meeting.

For example, if debating on a corporate decision, you can make a poll for participants to vote on the direction to take. Technically, the poll could be about anything, but it’s mainly used for topics relevant to the meeting.

The Q&A feature enables meeting participants to ask questions and receive feedback. These questions can be addressed during the meeting or later. After the meeting concludes, the host and moderator receive a detailed report of all questions asked, providing them with ample time to prepare detailed answers.

Attendance tracking is a valuable feature that Google Meet provides. With this feature, meeting hosts can track which invited participants attend their meeting and which do not. After a meeting, the host will receive an email report summarizing the attendance and duration, including participant names, join/leave times, and the total time each participant spent in the meeting.

If your meeting has a large number of participants, you may need to split participants into smaller groups to discuss relevant topics. It’s similar to how large conferences have smaller meetings that take place between main sessions. Google Meet offers a Breakout Rooms feature that makes this easy.

With Breakout Rooms, you can divide participants into smaller groups that hold distinct video meetings. These breakout meetings work exactly like the main one, with the same Q&A, polling, and attendance tracking features, among others. During a breakout meeting, participants can leave at any time and return to the main session.

From my observation, Google Meet’s audio quality is much better than that of most videoconferencing apps. I think there’s a simple explanation: Google Meet was relatively late to the videoconferencing game, having launched in 2017, compared to competitors like Zoom, which was launched in 2012 and Skype (now discontinued in favor of Microsoft Teams), which launched in the early 2000s.

To differentiate itself amid intense competition, Google’s engineers invested heavily in audio quality. Google Meet offers adaptive audio, which automatically tweaks audio settings to fit your environment, and noise cancellation powered by artificial intelligence (AI). I tested these features and they worked very well, hence my observation of Google Meet’s enhanced sound quality compared to other videoconferencing platforms.

I liked that I could share my screen with other participants during meetings. Screen sharing helps users communicate clearly and address problems in real-time. For example, you can teach a colleague how to use a software tool by demonstrating it live on your desktop, and they’ll view each step you take.

Live captioning is another helpful Google Meet feature, especially during group meetings. When turned on, every spoken word is automatically translated into text you can read. When testing the live captioning feature, it worked well most of the time, but occasionally made mistakes, which is the typical experience with transcription tools.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the talk of this era, and Google Meet doesn’t disappoint in this sector. I used the “takes notes for me” feature powered by Gemini, Google’s AI assistant, which can listen in on meetings and summarize the meeting notes for you. Meeting notes are saved in Google Drive, from which you can access them.

Like with most AI-based features, the meeting notes weren’t perfect. I noticed a few mistakes here and there, but they were decent, although not yet as good as taking the notes manually.

Google Meet: Interface and in use

I won’t mince words to say that Google Meet has a stellar interface. User-friendliness is an area where it outshines most competitors. Features are arranged neatly on the dashboard, with minimal background colors and prominently displayed buttons that make the interface easy to grasp.

Even as a first-time user, you’ll likely not have any problem understanding Google Meet’s interface. First-time users have on-screen tutorials to guide them, and a few minutes can be enough to understand the features.

Google Meet is accessible through a web interface or mobile app (iOS and Android). Both offer the same intuitive interface, functionalities, and extensive integration with other Google tools.

Google Meet: Support

Google offers decent customer support, although the available resources depend on your pricing tier.

Free users have access to Google’s Help Center, which contains detailed user guides and tutorials on Google Meet. All Google Meet features are covered in this Help Center, and it’s ideally the first place to visit for troubleshooting problems.

Free-tier users can also visit Google’s official forum and ask questions. Other users provide valuable help, and you can reciprocate by answering questions too. In my experience, Google Meet didn’t give me problems in the first place, so I didn’t need to consult the forum. The slight challenges I faced were quickly resolved by consulting the Help Center.

Expectedly, paid users have access to more support resources than free-tier users. As a paid user, you can contact Google's support team directly to help resolve any issues. You can do this via email, live chat, or telephone and get quick help. Support is generally fast, but users on the highest paid plans are prioritized more than others.

Google Meet: The competition

Videoconferencing is one of the most competitive software niches. Google Meet has many rivals, and the main ones I’d like to highlight are Zoom and Microsoft Teams.

Zoom is a standalone videoconferencing software that blossomed during the Covid pandemic circa 2020 and has remained atop the industry ever since. I’ve extensively tested Zoom to note its pros and cons compared to Google Meet.

Zoom has more advanced functionalities and customization options. It supports a larger number of meeting participants, which can include up to thousands on standard plans. Suppose you want to host a large webinar with over a thousand participants– Zoom is the better choice because its standard plans can host this audience volume, unlike Google Meet.

The drawback is that Zoom isn’t as user-friendly as Google Meet. Zoom’s interface appears more cluttered, partly due to its broader feature set, and it takes longer to become accustomed to the interface than Google Meet’s.

Microsoft Teams offers similar videoconferencing features to Google Meet. However, it provides more complementary features and is integrated with the Microsoft 365 suite of business tools. It offers more customization and third-party integration, both with Microsoft tools and external platforms.

However, I found Google Meet much easier to use– its interface is less cluttered and feels more interactive. Microsoft Teams has extensive features, but there’s a steep learning curve to get used to them.

Google Meet: Final verdict

I’ll recommend Google Meet for personal use and for small to medium-sized businesses. It’s an intuitive platform with robust features and integration with other Google tools.

Google Meet isn’t the best for large enterprises with many hundreds or thousands of employees. It’s also not ideal for companies that are locked into other business software ecosystems like Microsoft 365. Rather, it’s best suited for small to medium sized businesses that want to adopt Google Workspace as their collaborative software suite.

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Real-time chat is as important in the business world as it is in our personal lives. It enables information to flow smoothly within organizations, as colleagues can communicate with each other quickly when needed. Save for real-time chat, colleagues can also hold group video and audio calls to share ideas and receive feedback.

Google Chat is a real-time communication platform geared for business use. Its features facilitate effective collaboration among employees, and Google Chat is used by many companies worldwide.

However, what are Google Chat’s key features and what features are missing? How does it compare to its main rivals? I tested Google Chat extensively to help you answer these questions. Read to learn what Google Chat offers and how it compares against competitors, and then you can decide if it’s the best choice for your business.

Google Chat: Plans and pricing

Google Chat isn’t a standalone solution. Instead, the business version is offered as part of a Google Workspace subscription, which includes Chat and many other business tools.

Google Chat also has a free version for personal use. This version enables real-time communication between individuals but lacks the collaborative features offered in the business version.

There are three Google Workspace plans: Starter, Standard, and Plus. The Starter plan costs $6 per user per month, the Standard plan costs $14 per user per month, and the Plus plan costs $22 per user per month.

There’s not much difference in the three Workspace plans regarding Google Chat’s core functionalities. The differences are pronounced in other areas, including storage space, AI features, and videoconferencing, but Google Chat’s core features remain the same. For example, the Starter plan provides 30 GB of storage per user, while the Standard plan increases this to 2 TB, and the Plus plan increases it to 5 TB.

There’s an Enterprise Plus plan available to large organizations, but it does not have standard pricing. It’s reserved for large companies (usually 500+ employees) who want to negotiate custom deals with Google’s sales team.

Google offers a 14-day free trial for its Workspace plans. You can use this free trial to test the features before making your final decision. Google doesn’t have a precise refund policy, so ensure you’re comfortable with your plan before making a payment. A refund is possible, but it’ll take hectic back-and-forth conversations.

Google Chat: Features

Real-time chat is the core feature of Google Chat, as the name implies. It enables employees to chat and share important information, much like friends and family do through instant messaging apps.

Like typical instant messaging apps, Google Chat supports both individual chats and group chats. Users can create chat rooms called Spaces and collaborate, share files, and assign tasks to each other. Google Chat supports threaded replies, which makes it easy to keep up with a conversation.

By default, your chats are stored for 24 hours, but you can enable chat history to save them for up to 30 days. The storage time can be longer if you’re subscribed to the Plus plan, which unlocks Google Vault, a data retention service. You can set chats to be stored for your desired period on Google Vault, e.g., 180 or 365 days.

You can search through your chat conversations in detail, helped by Google’s powerful search algorithms. Google is best known as a search engine, so it’s no surprise that Google Chat incorporates a powerful search algorithm. In my observation, it’s much easier to search for specific information from your Google Chat history compared to other chat apps.

This feature may seem trivial, but I almost didn’t expect Google Chat to have read receipts, like typical messaging apps. I’m glad I encountered this feature, which let me know when recipients had read my messages.

Many business messaging apps purposely don't have read receipts, with the rationale that it creates pressure to respond immediately and can be a privacy intrusion. I understand this rationale, but I also find read receipts useful sometimes. However, I didn’t like the fact that Google Chat doesn’t allow users to turn off read receipts; I think users who aren’t comfortable with read receipts should have the option to do so.

You’ll be pleased to know that Google Chat offers much more than chat, thanks to its integration with other Google tools.

If your business is subscribed to Google Workspace, employees will have access to various Google tools, including Gmail, Google Meet, Docs, Slides, and more. It’s the integration with these tools that separates Google Chat from the competition.

For instance, I appreciated that I could initiate chat sessions directly from the Gmail dashboard, rather than having to open a separate Google Chat tab every time. An employee could be scrolling through their emails and notice an important piece of information to share with a colleague. In that case, they can quickly open the chat interface on the same Gmail dashboard and message the colleague.

Google Docs is another helpful integration. When employees are editing documents on Google Docs, they can open Google Chat on the same page and communicate with each other. This way, everyone working on the same document can share their ideas and suggest changes. There’s no need to juggle separate dashboards for document editing and real-time chat; Google delivers both on the same dashboard.

The above integration also applies to Google Sheets, which employees use to create spreadsheets. When multiple people are working on the same spreadsheet, they can use Google Chat to communicate without needing to open a separate tab.

Google Chat can be integrated with Google Calendar, which employees use for scheduling meetings and other events. Thanks to this integration, I could create and share calendar invites right on Google Chat. I also got automatic notifications in Google Chat whenever someone added a new event to the shared calendar.

The Google Drive integration lets users share files directly within chats. If you’ve previously uploaded the file on Google Drive, you can search for it and share it with a colleague, reducing the friction involved in sharing corporate files.

Earlier, when discussing the Spaces (group chat) functionality, I mentioned an example of colleagues assigning tasks to themselves. Google Chat is integrated with Google Tasks, which makes this process seamless. You can create a task directly within the chat menu and assign it to someone; the person will be immediately notified, and the task will be added to their dashboard.

A key feature I haven’t yet touched on is the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into Google Chat. AI is rapidly advancing in the technology industry, and Google is one of the companies leading the charge in the AI race. It operates Gemini, a generative AI chatbot that has been integrated into various Google tools, including Chat.

Gemini helped me compose messages when using Google Chat, and I particularly liked its quick reply suggestions. Whenever someone sent a routine message, Gemini suggested several replies, which I could easily pick from. The chatbot also suggests the next words and phrases as you type a message.

I’m not suggesting depending entirely on Gemini when chatting, as it has some flaws, but it saves significant time you would have spent typing mundane responses and thinking of what to write next.

Notably, Google Chat isn’t only integrated with Google tools. It’s integrated with many third-party apps, and you can access these integrations on the Google Workspace app marketplace.

For example, businesses can integrate Google Chat with Jira, a popular project tracking and management platform. With this integration, employees can receive Google Chat notifications about any changes made on Jira. Suppose the due date for a Jira task changes; the people assigned to that task will be notified via Google Chat. This is just an example of many valuable integrations I tested on Google Chat.

Google Chat: Interface and in use

I’ve tested many Google tools, and user-friendliness is a criterion where they perform excellently. Google Chat is no exception. It has a simple interface that I think anyone can find easy to navigate. It doesn’t take much to get used to the interface, thanks to its neat arrangement of features and the use of minimal colors that make navigation easy.

Google Chat’s intuitive interface is in contrast to some business messaging apps I’ve reviewed. While these apps offer more functionalities, their interfaces are often cluttered and require more time to get used to. Google Chat stands out by not having a steep learning curve.

Google Chat is accessible from your web browser or mobile app. Employees can access all features conveniently from their web browser or download the mobile app to chat on the go.

A drawback is that Google Chat lacks a desktop app, unlike some of its rivals. For example, Slack offers a desktop app that I enjoyed using even more than the web version.

Google Chat: Support

Google Chat has decent customer support. If you’re on the free, personal tier, there’s no direct support from Google’s team, but you can consult Google’s Help Center to troubleshoot issues. The Help Center contains user guides and manuals to troubleshoot all Google Chat features.

If you’re a paid Google Workspace subscriber, you can get direct help from Google’s support team. The team is available via email, live chat, or telephone and provides help to resolve problems that you can’t solve yourself.

On the bright side, Google Chat has a user-friendly interface that didn’t give me problems to resolve in the first place. The few hiccups I faced were related to learning how to use some features, and I quickly resolved them via the Help Center.

Google Chat: The competition

Slack and Microsoft Teams are the two main competitors to Google Chat that I’d like to highlight.

Slack is a versatile communication tool with many functionalities. It has an interactive and smooth workflow that makes business messaging enjoyable. It’s highly customizable, for example, by allowing users to receive notifications when someone mentions a specific keyword in a group chat. It has advanced search functionalities similar to what’s available on Google Chat.

I wouldn’t say there’s a clear better choice between Slack and Google Chat; it depends more on your needs. Slack is ideal for large companies due to its extensive customizability and third-party integrations. Google Chat is ideal for smaller companies needing a simple solution or for companies already subscribed to Google Workspace that don’t want to pay extra for a communication tool.

Microsoft Teams isn’t a standalone chat app, but rather one that combines Chat and many other functionalities. It’s similar to having a Google Workspace subscription that unlocks access to many features, including chat, document editing, file storage, and videoconferencing.

Microsoft Teams offers more features and has better customizability than Google Workspace. Regarding chat, Google is a streamlined, lightweight option, while Microsoft provides more advanced features for large organizations.

However, Google Workspace beats Microsoft in user-friendliness. I found it far simpler to navigate than Microsoft Teams, which has a steep learning curve. If you choose Microsoft Teams, expect employees to spend more time getting used to its features.

Google Chat: Final verdict

I recommend Google Chat for companies that already use Google services and need a simple chat tool for employees. The seamless integration with other Google apps makes Google Chat a wise choice in this case.

However, I don’t think Google Chat offers much as a standalone alternative against rivals like Slack. If you’re adopting Google Chat, it should be because you’re adopting the whole Google Workspace ecosystem, not just the chat tool.

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PowerPoint has been the go-to presentation software for decades, but competition has gradually eaten into its market share, although PowerPoint remains dominant.

Google Slides is one of the main competitors that are grabbing some market share from PowerPoint. It’s a cloud-based presentation software whose strengths lie in collaboration, an intuitive interface, and advanced features.

Google Slides is a formidable PowerPoint competitor, but is it the best presentation software for you? I tested the app extensively to help you answer this question. Read on to learn about Google Slides’ features, pros, cons, and how it fares against PowerPoint and other rivals.

Google Slides: Plans and pricing

Like most Google tools, Slides has a free version available to anyone with a Google account. This free version gives you access to the core presentation creation features. However, storage is limited to 15 GB, and the free plan doesn’t offer advanced collaborative features that the paid plan does.

The paid version of Google Slides isn’t a standalone subscription. Rather, it’s offered as part of a Google Workspace subscription, which includes Slides, Google Docs, Google Sheets, and many other tools. A Google Workspace subscription gives you access to numerous tools that help your business run smoothly; Slides is one of these tools.

You can choose from one of three Google Workspace plans: Starter, Standard, and Plus. The Starter plan costs $7 per user per month and unlocks 30 GB of storage for each account. It also unlocks access to Gemini, Google’s artificial intelligence chatbot, which assists you in creating the best presentations on Google Slides. However, you can only use Gemini as a separate app on this plan; it’s not directly integrated with Google Slides.

The Standard plan costs $7 per user per month. It provides a sizable 2 TB of storage for each corporate account, enough to store a massive volume of presentations made on Google Slides. The Standard plan unlocks direct Gemini integration with Google Slides. Instead of using Gemini as a separate app, you can interact with it directly on your Google Slides dashboard, which is more convenient than constantly switching between Slides and Gemini tabs.

The Plus plan costs $22 per user per month. It unlocks a whopping 5 TB of storage per account, which covers presentations and other files created with Google apps. Like the Standard plan, it includes Gemini integration, which enables you to ask the AI assistant for direct help when creating presentations. For example, you can ask Gemini to create a presentation template or give you ideas for what to include in your presentation.

There’s also an Enterprise Plus plan, albeit reserved for large corporations. This plan has no standard pricing, so interested companies have to contact Google’s sales team to negotiate a deal. It has the most advanced security features, making it ideal for large corporations (think 500+ employees) with high security needs.

Each Google Workspace plan includes a 14-day free trial, which you can leverage to test the features before making your final decision. The free version of Google Slides, which includes access to the core features, also gives you a hint of what to expect on a paid plan.

Google Slides: Features

Google Slides offers tools that enable you to create visually appealing, informative presentations. If you’ve used PowerPoint, the interface feels very similar. You have access to dozens of pre-built templates covering various topics, which you can edit to create your presentations. Otherwise, you can start from scratch and add different elements (shapes, images, videos, text boxes, etc.) to create your presentation.

Collaboration is Google Slides’ main competitive edge. It makes it easy for multiple people to work together on the same presentation. Under Google Workspace, team members have access to Google Chat, so they can hold real-time conversations on the same dashboard as they create presentations.

Team members can leave comments on specific parts of a presentation, for example, to recommend new information to add. They can also directly suggest changes, and the document owner can decide whether to accept or reject their suggestions. If a suggestion is accepted, it’ll be automatically implemented.

When multiple people work on the same presentation, each person will have a unique icon displayed at the top. These icons let others know who is currently on the same presentation document. Each person will also have a live pointer indicating where their cursor is positioned on the presentation.

You might be wondering who controls access to a presentation during collaborative editing. The answer is you, or the person who created the presentation originally. As a document owner, you decide how to share a document and what others can do with it. When sharing a presentation, you can set one of three permissions for other users: Viewer, Commenter, or Editor.

As the name implies, a Viewer can only view a presentation and monitor the editing process, but they can’t comment or suggest their own edits. A Commenter can leave comments or suggestions for the document owner; it’s up to the owner to accept or reject the suggestions.

In contrast, an Editor has the same permissions as the document owner. They can directly make changes without the owner’s prior approval. These precise permission levels let you assign different roles to people working on the same presentation. For example, you can assign a colleague as an Editor and your supervisor as a Commenter. The colleague can make direct changes, and the Supervisor can suggest ideas without making direct changes.

I liked the Version History feature, which let users restore previous versions of a document if the current one isn’t ideal. For example, when someone edited a presentation in a way I didn’t like, I quickly reverted to a previous version that existed before their edits.

As collaborators edit a document, Google stores each version at different time instants. On the Version History menu, you can view all the previously stored versions and restore any of them. With the Version History feature, you’re confident that any accidental mistakes can be undone. This feature also fosters accountability among collaborators, as everyone knows their changes can be tracked and undone if needed.

Gemini integration was a major highlight when using Google Slides. I used Gemini in many ways that made creating presentations more fun and convenient. For example, I used Gemini to generate images for presentations. The images weren’t always the best (some looked too unnatural), but they were suitable for use in real presentations.

I instructed Gemini to provide ideas for new presentation slides, and it excelled at this task. It gave valuable ideas and helped me rewrite or generate new text when needed. However, Gemini isn’t perfect. Its text often sounded robotic, requiring further editing to make it sound human-like.

Other ways you can use Gemini include asking it to summarize existing presentations or creating templates for a unique topic you’re about to present. The drawback is that direct Gemini integration is only available on the Standard plan or above. If you’re subscribed to the Starter plan, you can use Gemini as a separate app but not directly in Google Slides, which is less convenient. Gemini isn’t available on the free Google Slides plan.

Google Slides has a wide range of pre-made templates. You can use these templates as the foundation of your presentations instead of creating them from scratch. The pre-built templates cover everything from status reports to case studies, project wireframes, book reports, and many more.

If you don’t find a suitable template in Google’s pre-built library, you can create your own and reuse it many times. As I mentioned earlier, Gemini provides valuable help in creating your templates.

I liked Google Slides’ versatility regarding presentation files. You can upload files created on rival platforms, such as Microsoft PowerPoint and Canva, and edit them on Google Slides.

For example, you may have created a presentation with PowerPoint but need others to help you refine it. In that case, you can upload the PowerPoint file to Google Slides, then take advantage of the collaborative features to edit it together with your colleagues. Note that you may observe some formatting inconsistencies after importing presentations from other apps, but you can easily correct them.

Although it’s primarily built for online use, Google Slides has an offline mode where you can edit a presentation without an internet connection. Once your internet connection returns, every change made offline automatically syncs online.

Google Slides has a network of third-party add-ons that provide extra functionality, from translation to custom fonts, stock images, icons, and more. All in, Google Slides is a reliable presentation platform with many valuable features. If you need a tool for employees to collaboratively create and edit presentations, it’s the go-to choice. Google Slides outshines most competitors in collaborativeness and intuitiveness.

Google Slides: Interface and in use

It may just be my personal observation, but Google tools usually excel in user-friendliness. Google Slides is one of the most intuitive tools I’ve used. Its interface is easy to grasp even for first-time users.

If you’ve used any presentation software before, Google Slides feels very similar. The homepage displays some templates and a button to begin a new presentation, as well as previews of the presentations you’ve previously created. When you tap the button to create a presentation, you’ll be taken to the main page where you can begin working on it.

With formatting options and other features arranged neatly at the top and the main body below, Google Slides is as easy to grasp as it gets. However, some complex features may require time to get used to.

Google Slides: Support

Google Slides users have access to significant support resources. When facing issues, the first place to consult is the Slides section of the Google Workspace Learning Center. This section includes detailed user guides, cheat sheets, and manuals for troubleshooting issues. It also includes tips for creating and sharing the best presentations.

The Learning Center has extensive details and is sufficient to solve most issues. But if you need further help as a Google Workspace subscriber, you can contact Google’s support team via email, live chat, or telephone. Free-tier users don’t have direct access to the support team, but the Learning Center provides ample resources to resolve issues.

Google Slides: The competition

PowerPoint and Canva are the two main Google Slides competitors I’d like to highlight. PowerPoint is the most widely used presentation software, and Google created the Slides app to grab a slice of PowerPoint’s market share.

Google Slides outshines PowerPoint in collaboration and accessibility. It’s a cloud-based tool that enables many people to work on the same presentation seamlessly. PowerPoint also has a cloud-based version that enables collaboration, but it doesn’t feel as seamless as using Google Slides.

However, PowerPoint outshines Google Slides with its advanced features and offline capabilities. If you want to create the most complex presentations full of rich visual elements, PowerPoint is a better choice. It has a broader collection of templates, visual elements, and add-ons that provide functionalities not natively available on PowerPoint.

Canva is similar to Google Slides as it emphasizes seamless collaboration and the ability to create visually appealing presentations. It’s a decent tool for creating presentations, but the drawback is the relative cost.

A Canva Teams subscription isn’t as economical as a Google Workspace subscription, considering that the latter gives you access to not just Slides but many other tools like Google Docs, Sheets, Meet, and more. In contrast, you’ll be paying only for a design tool with a Canva subscription, unlike Google Workspace that kills multiple birds with one stone.

Google Slides: Final verdict

Google Slides has its unique strengths and drawbacks, but it’s a presentation tool I’d recommend to anyone. It’s cost-effective, considering the other tools a Google Workspace subscription also unlocks, and enables seamless collaboration to create presentations. Google Slides might not be a PowerPoint killer, but it’s a reliable alternative for personal and business use.

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Freshworks is a multiproduct, scalable software solution that offers total support for commercial businesses. Its five products provide customer relationship management (CRM) support for customer service, sales and marketing, as well as software support for IT and HR.

With this Freshworks review, we go over every aspect of the Freshworks product suite, compare its products with the competition, and tell you everything you need to know to decide if Freshworks is the best CRM software solution for your business.

Freshworks review: Snapshot

The Freshworks software suite offers a comprehensive CRM solution for commercial businesses. There are five products available to users: customer support, sales, marketing, HR, and IT.

Budget-sensitive users can benefit from Freshworks’ generous free offering, which provides enough functionality to meet the needs of a solopreneur or small business. Freshworks also boasts a very short setup time—around 48 hours. Conversely, most competitor products can take weeks or months to set up.

On the other hand, Freshworks has a smaller range of customization options relative to its competitors. Some users, especially larger organizations, may need to make major changes to the UI or create very specific custom fields, and might be better served by Salesforce (US-only link) or HubSpot in this regard.

Despite the limited amount of customization, though, we consider Freshworks to be a well-rounded software suite that is best suited for small business users.

Score: 4.5/5

Read on for the full review.

Freshworks: Key features

Freshworks offers five products, each with four levels of pricing depending on your needs and the size of your organization. Each product is a fully functional platform that provides support for a specific business need: customer service, sales, marketing, human resources, or IT.

Freshdesk

Freshdesk is a CRM focused on customer service across all channels. Its core function is to provide a ticketing system that converts customer inquiries from all channels into one inbox. From there, tickets are automatically processed and forwarded to the relevant agent. Users can customize which agent receives each type of ticket and which tickets are considered a priority. Read our full Freshdesk CRM review for more.

Freshsales

Freshsales is a CRM designed to maximize the effectiveness of users’ sales teams. Its key features include a visual sales pipeline and a system for automatically prioritizing and qualifying leads. It also has configurable automation settings for repetitive tasks, such as sending follow-up emails to clients. To learn more, read our Freshsales CRM review.

Freshmarketer

Freshmarketer is a CRM for streamlining and automating marketing activities. You can use Freshmarketer to run email marketing campaigns, optimize your website for maximum conversion, and communicate directly with customers via email and chat. Find out more in our detailed Freshmarketer CRM review.

Freshservice

Freshservice is Freshworks’ IT support CRM. It’s functionally similar to Freshdesk, in that it is primarily a CRM for optimizing support tickets. It contains the same basic features, such as aggregating inquiries from multiple channels into a single ticket inbox. However, unlike Freshdesk, it is ITIL compliant and therefore suitable for IT support. It also adds IT-specific functions for incident management handling, change, problem and release management, and asset management. For more, take a look at our Freshservice review.

Freshteam

Freshteam is an HR management service that provides paperless onboarding, automation for repetitive tasks like resume screening and follow-up emails, and a system for tracking employee time off. It also aggregates staff information into one employee database. Employees can access the system to request time off, browse internal job openings, and connect with other members of the organization easily within the CRM.

Freshworks: What’s new?

Freshworks continues to update its total business CRM suite on a monthly basis, and 2021 saw numerous changes. A particularly noteworthy feature is CRM migration. It is now possible to migrate CRM data from competitors, such as HubSpot, directly into the Freshworks suite with just a few clicks.

In terms of cross-platform features, Freshworks has implemented full Slack integration in its sales CRM, Freshsales. Users can create a private chat channel specific to a particular deal, and chat directly from an integrated window in the Freshsales web app.

Another change is the ability to reorder sections of the page in Freshworks. The Freshworks UI features multiple sections. For instance, in Freshsales, some sections show recent conversations, recent activities, and related accounts. These sections can be hidden or unhidden, and rearranged as needed. Although customization still remains limited, this change gives users more options than they had before.

Freshworks pricing

Freshworks offers four different pricing tiers across each of its five products: Free, Growth, Pro, and Enterprise. Overall, we find its pricing to be quite competitive, especially for the lower-end plan options.

Billing is flexible, with monthly and annual options available. Compared to the monthly option, the annual pricing is discounted 17% across the board for all of Freshworks’ pricing plans. Below is a comparison of one of Freshworks’ most popular offerings, Freshsales, against comparable offers by key competitors.

*Prices are per user. HubSpot pricing is $45 for a minimum of two users, so one user is priced at $22.50.

Freshworks competitors

Salesforce and HubSpot are Freshworks’ closest competitors in the CRM market.

Salesforce is an established total CRM solution. At its core, it functions similarly to Freshworks, providing CRM products to fit specific business needs. The difference is in the scope: where Freshworks offers five products, Salesforce offers 14. It also offers near total customization to the user.

Implementation is a two-to-eight week process, during which the user works with the Salesforce development team to create a CRM experience that is uniquely tailored to their needs. The software is priced accordingly, being significantly more expensive than a Freshworks subscription.

Salesforce is most suitable for an organization with a large budget and CRM needs that go beyond what a basic product package can provide. Read our Salesforce review to find out more.

HubSpot is also a total CRM solution, offering products for sales, customer service, and marketing. Unlike Freshworks, HubSpot does not offer HR and IT support. Also, we found that HubSpot is a bit more expensive than Freshworks at each pricing tier.

On the other hand, all fields in the HubSpot CRM, as well as most of the UI, can be modified, rearranged, or removed as the user requires. Additionally, HubSpot’s app marketplace is larger than Freshworks’, with 900 apps to Freshworks’ 650. This means that overall, HubSpot provides more customization options than Freshworks. Read our HubSpot CRM review to learn more.

Freshworks is less expensive, offers IT and HR products, and is faster to set up. So unless the user places a huge amount of importance on customization, we consider Freshworks to be the best option for small commercial businesses.

For mid- to large-sized enterprises, it comes down to how much they want to tailor the software to their specific needs. If a default product that is ready to go quickly is sufficient, then Freshworks is again the best option. Otherwise, Salesforce is probably the best CRM solution.

Let’s see just how Freshworks compares to its primary competitors.

Getting started with Freshworkds

We tested setup time by downloading Freshmarketer, the marketing CRM, which was very easy to implement. After we input our login information, the system was ready to use in-browser, leading to a total setup time of fewer than five minutes.

With the help of Freshmarketer’s tutorial, it took another 10 minutes or so to import some contacts and create a basic marketing "journey". Journeys are Freshmarker's marketing campaigns. Our journey mapped out our cold email campaign and set follow-up dates.

Freshworks’ website features testimonials describing setup in less than 48 hours. Based on our own testing experience, this timeframe is realistic. It can be even shorter, depending on the user’s customization needs.

Some users will want customization beyond the default offering, so we decided to test just how much customization Freshworks offers.

Freshworks customizations

Customization is an important part of any CRM software. Every user has their own unique needs, and some tailoring of the software will inevitably be required. With this in mind, we tested exactly how much customization Freshworks offers to users.

The major features of the program UI, like sidebar layout and navbar position, are fixed, but there is a large amount of useful customization within the existing fields. For example, contacts in the database can be edited with up to 27 pre-set fields such as name, address, annual revenue, and territory. If none of those 27 options suit you, it is easy to create your own custom field in just a few clicks.

Moreover, Freshworks features one-click import from other CRMs and easy integration of apps from the Freshworks marketplace. Although Freshworks may not have the same level of customization as some of its competitors, the available options are more than sufficient for a client looking to make tweaks to the basic package.

How we test CRMs

Since Freshworks features five separate products, we chose to test features that are common across all of them: namely, setup time and customization. These features are particularly important to small business owners and solopreneurs, who may not be able to accept weeks of downtime while setting up a CRM service.

Freshworks: Final verdict

Freshworks is a powerful platform offered at a reasonable price. It offers comprehensive HR and IT support, something that is missing from many CRMs. It's great for empowering collaboration and boosting employee productivity.

It is also extremely straightforward to install. Many features, such as the Freshmarketer product, are ready to use almost immediately. Most CRMs can take several weeks to get up and running, while Freshworks can be online in less than 48 hours.

Its customization options are decent, with a growing marketplace of over 650 apps. But CRMs with a larger customization offering, like Salesforce or HubSpot, might be more suitable for companies with high customization needs.

Customer support is present 24/5 by live chat, phone, and email on all product tiers. At the highest pricing tier, Enterprise, users receive a dedicated support person for their account. This means that Freshworks support improves for premium users, but is still highly accessible for free and growth tier users.

Overall, thanks to its broad umbrella of software, Freshworks offers something for everyone. Its products are quick to get up and running, and are easy to use. They cover a wide range of use cases and offer limited but sufficient customization. Moreover, Freshworks is highly scalable and offers a robust free plan for all its products.

For these reasons, we consider it to be the perfect solution for budget-conscious users, or businesses that prioritize a quick launch and ease-of-use over extensive customization.

Freshworks FAQ