SIP vs VoIP
Work in any business and you’ve more than likely come in contact with the world of digital phone systems. You might have even heard of a couple of names in relation to them – such as VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, and SIP, or Session Initiation Protocol. These systems are pivotal to businesses, allowing them to reduce costs of both local and international calls. The question remains, however, what exactly are they, and what are their differences?
In this article, we’ll define both SIP and VoIP as well as their differences, services, and options to help you decide what will work best for your business!
VoIP
VoIP works is essentially a digital phone service that allows anyone to place phone calls over an internet connection. This removes the process of traditional phone wires since audio is digitized and sent over the internet. Similar to a video call-just without the video.
By removing the hassle of dealing with wires and old phone systems you have the option of a significantly less expensive cloud-based system in VoIP. This also means you no longer need to add physical phone lines. You also get the ability to integrate software that does everything from routing calls to saving digital recordings of calls.
SIP
Simply put SIP is how we start and end real-time online conversations today. SIP can be any live communication, such as video, conferencing, and audio. SIP itself is just a communications protocol that serves as a set of rules used by digital devices to communicate with each other. In fact, one of the best examples of this is how SIP is used to make VoIP calls possible.
SIP vs VoIP
Rather than compare SIP vs VoIP, it would be better to look at them as a duo: supporting act, SIP, and VoIP as the main show. In fact, for many VoIP business users, SIP is instrumental in initiating, maintaining, and ending a phone call between two or more devices. This doesn’t mean VoIP necessarily needs SIP to function as various internet protocols can be used to facilitate voice communications alone.
However, SIP and VoIP are widely used together due to SIP allowing for video and text, directly connecting PBX (private branch exchange) users with public network phone users, and allows companies to consolidate technologies via unified communications.
SIP Trunking
To run a VoIP phone system with SIP, a SIP trunk is necessary. What is a SIP trunk? It is essentially a piece of hardware that allows your business’ SIP phones and devices to connect to the internet. Depending on how you’re hosting, this device can be located at a data center or if self-hosted, installed into your business’s internal network.
One of the biggest benefits of SIP trunking is its ability to allow users to share access by grouping everyone on a single line. This means you can essentially have as many incoming or outgoing phone calls as your business needs. The only limitations being based on how many VoIP calls your company can handle and your internet bandwidth.
Choosing the Best Hardware
With all the benefits VoIP and SIP have to offer, choosing the right phone system for your business is one of the most important investments you can make. A successful VoIP business phone system based on SIP needs compatible and high-quality SIP hardware.
Luckily, QSG offers just that and more through our VoIP’s unified communications. Easy to install with our “plug-and-play” setup boasting enterprise-level features such as SIP trunk providers, service-side CRM integration, and much more, you can experience state-of-the-art equipment and streamlined service with QSG VoIP.
Summary
VoIP is another type of phone system that is completely digital in that you can place your phone calls through the internet instead of physical wires.
SIP is a communications protocol that allows for various kinds of live communications including VoIP calls.
SIP, because of its ability to allow for integration with other software, enabling of other multimedia, and more is widely popular especially in its pairing with VoIP. Together they can reduce the burdens caused by analog phone systems and significantly reduce costs of calls overall. Give us a call today to learn how VoIP with SIP can ease frustrations and bring your business phone system to the next level!
