The integration-first cloud phone for teams that answer as much as they dial
Aircall is a cloud phone system and light contact centre for sales and support teams, built around more than 250 native integrations, IVR and smart routing, call recording with AI transcription and summaries, a single-line Power Dialer with voicemail drop on its Professional plan, and deep Salesforce and HubSpot CTI, priced at $30 per licence per month on Essentials and $50 on Professional with annual billing and a three-licence minimum.
Overview
Aircall was founded in Paris in 2014 out of the eFounders startup studio, on the premise that the business phone had been left behind by the SaaS wave. Every other business system had become an API-connected app; the phone was still a piece of hardware with a proprietary console. Aircall's answer was a phone system whose primary design constraint was integration: 250-plus connectors, a real CTI inside Salesforce and HubSpot, and an API that treats calls as events other systems can act on.
That focus made it the default choice for the segment between a small-business phone and a full contact centre. A twelve-person team running sales and support out of the same numbers gets IVR, smart routing, ring groups, mandatory call tagging, analytics with six months of history, and call recording, without any of the PBX vocabulary that legacy vendors still expect buyers to learn. It became eFounders' first unicorn in 2021 with a $120M Series D led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management, on total funding of roughly $226M.
For outbound specifically, Aircall is capable but not aggressive. The Power Dialer on the Professional plan works a list one number at a time, with voicemail drop to skip the greeting. There is no parallel dialing, no predictive mode, no answering machine detection, and no local presence number rotation pool. Compared to Kixie's four lines or CloudTalk's ten, this is a paced dialer for teams whose calls are conversations rather than a volume game.
Pricing is per licence with a three-licence floor: $30 a licence per month on Essentials with annual billing, $50 on Professional, and a Custom tier at a twenty-five-licence minimum for SSO, SLA, and API developer support. Monthly billing costs meaningfully more at roughly $40 and $70. AI voice and messaging agents are metered separately, additional numbers are billed per number, and several capabilities are per-licence add-ons, which is why buyer research repeatedly lands on a real cost per fully equipped seat well above the list price.
Best for
Sales and support teams of roughly five to fifty people who need a reliable phone system that integrates deeply with Salesforce, HubSpot, or Zendesk, handle inbound and outbound in roughly equal measure, and want routing, tagging, and analytics without running a contact centre platform.
Not the right fit for
- Solo operators and pairs. The three-licence minimum means the real entry price is $90 a month on Essentials, and Essentials has no dialer, no analytics, and no Salesforce CTI.
- High-volume outbound floors. The Power Dialer is single-line with no answering machine detection and no parallel mode, so a team measured on dials per hour will be beaten badly by Kixie, CloudTalk, PhoneBurner, or Salesfinity.
- Teams that need local presence dialing from a rotating pool of area-code-matched numbers with spam remediation; Aircall sells numbers but does not sell the reputation machinery around them.
- Budget-constrained buyers who want one predictable number. AI voice and messaging agents, extra numbers, and several capabilities are metered or per-licence add-ons, and the effective cost of a fully equipped seat commonly lands in the $70 to $100 range.
- Anyone whose IT policy requires SSO. Single sign-on sits on the Custom tier with a twenty-five-licence minimum, which is a steep gate for a mid-sized team.
How it works
- 1
You sign up self-serve, buy numbers in the countries you operate in, and connect the tools you already use. The integration step is the point of the product: Salesforce, HubSpot, Zendesk, Intercom, Pipedrive, Slack, and roughly 250 others connect natively, so the phone becomes a feature of the systems your team already lives in.
- 2
Inbound calls hit an IVR or a routing rule and land with the right ring group based on skills, business hours, or caller. Agents work from the desktop or mobile app or from a CTI panel inside the CRM, with the caller's record open before they say hello.
- 3
For outbound list work on the Professional plan, a rep loads a call list into the Power Dialer and works through it one number at a time. Voicemail drop leaves a pre-recorded message in one click. Mandatory call tagging can be enforced so no call closes without a disposition, which is the mechanism that keeps reporting honest.
- 4
Every call is recorded, transcribed, and summarized by the AI layer, then written back to the CRM record along with tags and notes. Managers work from analytics covering up to six months of history, monitor live calls, and use AI Assist features to review conversations without listening to all of them. AI Voice Agents can handle overflow or after-hours calls on a metered minute allowance.
Feature breakdown
28 features in 5 modulesIntegrations and CTI
The reason Aircall exists and the reason people stay.- 250-plus native integrations
- The largest native connector catalogue in small-business phone, covering CRMs, helpdesks, e-commerce platforms, and productivity tools, so the phone plugs into whatever stack already exists.
- Salesforce CTI
- A proper computer telephony integration panel inside Salesforce on the Professional tier, rather than a click-to-call link, with screen pop, in-console dialing, and activity write-back.
- HubSpot integration
- Two-way sync of calls, recordings, tags, and notes onto contact and deal records, with click-to-call from inside HubSpot.
- Zendesk and Intercom connectors
- Support-side integrations that create or update tickets from calls, which is why mixed sales-and-support teams pick Aircall over pure sales dialers.
- Public API and webhooks
- Calls, recordings, tags, and user events exposed as API objects and webhook payloads. Dedicated API developer support is a Custom-tier feature.
- Click-to-dial anywhere
- Dial from any integrated app or from a browser without copying numbers into a softphone.
Routing and call handling
Light contact centre capability without contact centre complexity.- IVR menus
- Multi-level interactive voice response so callers self-route, included from the Essentials tier.
- Smart routing
- Professional adds routing based on skills, availability, and caller attributes rather than simple round-robin, which is what keeps qualified callers off the wrong desk.
- Ring groups and business hours
- Team-based ringing with time-of-day rules and holiday handling, configured without a dial plan.
- Call queuing and callback
- Callers hold in a queue with position awareness rather than hitting a busy tone.
- Warm transfer and conference
- Hand a call to a colleague with context, or bring a third party on, from the same panel.
- Softphone across desktop and mobile
- Native desktop and mobile apps plus a web client, so agents work from an office, home, or a phone without a hardware handset.
Outbound dialing
Paced and personal, deliberately not a volume machine.- Power Dialer
- Professional tier. Works a loaded call list one number at a time so the rep is prepared for each conversation. Single-line only, with no parallel or predictive mode.
- Voicemail drop
- Leave a pre-recorded message in one click and move on, which is the single biggest time saving available on a single-line dialer.
- Mandatory call tagging
- Professional can require a disposition tag before a call is closed, which is how outbound reporting stays trustworthy rather than becoming optional data entry.
- Unlimited outbound calling
- Included in the licence within the plan's calling scope, so North American outbound does not carry per-minute arithmetic.
- Call lists from integrated tools
- Dialing lists can be built from CRM views rather than uploaded as CSVs, keeping the CRM as system of record.
AI, recording, and analytics
Solid post-call intelligence, metered agents on top.- Call recording
- Included from Essentials, with recordings attached to the CRM record and retention governed by plan and configuration.
- AI transcription and summaries
- AI Assist features on the Professional tier transcribe calls and produce summaries, so a manager can read a conversation instead of listening to it.
- AI Voice Agents
- Autonomous voice handling with 50 free minutes per account per month plus 100 bonus minutes at signup, then metered per minute with bundles from 500 to 10,000-plus minutes.
- AI Messaging Agents
- Automated messaging conversations with 100 free conversations included, then billed per conversation.
- Advanced analytics with six months of history
- Professional includes basic and advanced analytics with up to six months of retained reporting, covering volume, missed calls, wait times, and per-agent performance.
- Live call monitoring
- Managers can listen to calls in progress for coaching and quality assurance.
Numbers, messaging, and administration
The operational surface a growing team needs.- One number included per plan
- A local or toll-free number comes with the plan, and additional numbers are billed separately per number per month.
- International number availability
- Numbers available across a wide set of countries, which suits distributed teams presenting local identities in several markets.
- SMS and MMS
- Business texting from Aircall numbers, subject to per-country availability and US carrier registration rules.
- Number porting
- Existing business numbers port in on a standard LOA process rather than being abandoned at switchover.
- User and permission management
- Role-based control over recordings, numbers, and configuration, with SSO reserved for the Custom tier.
Use cases
4 documentedSaaS company running sales and support on one phone system
Sales wants CRM logging and outbound dialing, support wants queues and ticket creation, and nobody wants to buy two phone systems.
Professional licences give sales the Power Dialer and Salesforce CTI while support gets smart routing and the Zendesk connector, all on one bill with shared numbers and shared analytics.
Salesforce-native revenue team
Reps context-switch between Salesforce and a softphone all day, and call activity reaches Salesforce late or not at all.
The CTI panel puts dialing, screen pop, tagging, and notes inside the Salesforce console, and mandatory call tagging means no call closes without a disposition that reporting can rely on.
Distributed team presenting local numbers in several countries
A UK, French, and US customer base each expects to call a local number, and the current setup forwards everything to one line.
Country-local numbers route through IVR to the right ring group by business hours, and agents work from the same app regardless of which market called.
Head of support measuring service quality
There is no reliable view of wait times, missed calls, or per-agent load, so staffing decisions are guesses.
Advanced analytics with six months of history plus live monitoring gives real numbers on queue performance, and AI summaries let quality review cover far more calls than listening ever could.
Pricing
from $30 per licence per month billed annually, three-licence minimumPer-licence per-month subscription with a three-licence minimum on published plans and a twenty-five-licence minimum on Custom, one number included per plan, unlimited outbound within scope, and metered AI voice and messaging agents on top.
| Plan | Price | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Essentials | $30 per licence per month billed annually ($40 monthly), minimum 3 licences |
No Power Dialer, no Salesforce CTI, no advanced analytics. Effective floor is $90 a month. |
| Professional | $50 per licence per month billed annually ($70 monthly), minimum 3 licences |
The tier any sales team actually needs. The dialer, the CTI, and the reporting all live here. |
| Custom | Custom quoted, minimum 25 licences |
SSO behind a 25-licence minimum is the most awkward gate in Aircall's packaging. |
Add-ons
- AI Voice Agents (Metered per minute after 50 free minutes per account per month): 100 bonus minutes at signup; bundles available from 500 to 10,000-plus minutes.
- AI Messaging Agents (Per conversation after 100 free conversations)
- Additional phone numbers (Per number per month)
- Per-licence feature add-ons (Quoted per licence per month): Several capabilities are sold as licence-level add-ons rather than bundled.
Billing notes
- The three-licence minimum applies to both published plans, so the real starting price is $90 a month on Essentials and $150 on Professional with annual billing.
- Monthly billing costs roughly a third more: about $40 a licence on Essentials and $70 on Professional.
- Aircall's pricing page renders prices dynamically by region, so the figures shown to you may differ by country and currency. Confirm during signup.
- AI Voice and Messaging Agents are separately metered. The free allowances are small enough that any real deployment moves to a paid bundle quickly.
- Additional numbers are billed per number per month rather than bundled into licences, which is a meaningful difference from Quo where a number comes with every seat.
- Independent buyer research repeatedly reports fully equipped seats landing between $70 and $100 a month once analytics, AI, extra numbers, and add-ons are included.
- SSO requires the Custom tier and a twenty-five-licence commitment, so security-driven buyers should price that jump before starting.
Value assessment: Professional at $50 a licence buys the best integration surface in this category, a proper Salesforce CTI, credible routing, and six months of analytics, which is fair for a mixed sales-and-support team. It is poor value for pure outbound, because $50 buys a single-line dialer where Kixie's roughly $95 buys four lines with human voice detection and JustCall's $49 buys a power dialer with local presence and number rotation. The three-licence floor also means Aircall is never the cheapest option for a small team. Buy it for breadth and reliability, not for dials per hour.
Strengths & limitations
Strengths
- The deepest integration catalogue in small-business phone at more than 250 native connectors, plus a genuine Salesforce CTI rather than a click-to-call shim.
- Routing, IVR, queuing, and mandatory call tagging give a small team real contact centre discipline without contact centre software.
- Advanced analytics with six months of retained history is more reporting depth than most competitors offer below enterprise pricing.
- Mature, well-funded, and stable: eFounders' first unicorn, roughly $226M raised, and more than a decade of continuous operation with offices across four continents.
- Call recording is included from the entry tier rather than gated behind a mid-plan upgrade.
- Native desktop, mobile, and web clients plus CTI panels mean agents can work from anywhere without a hardware handset.
- AI transcription and summaries on Professional make quality review practical across a whole team rather than a sampled few calls.
Limitations
- The Power Dialer is single-line with no parallel mode, no predictive mode, and no answering machine detection, which makes Aircall uncompetitive for high-volume outbound.
- No local presence number pool, no automatic number rotation, and no spam remediation service, so caller ID reputation is your problem to manage externally.
- A three-licence minimum on every published plan excludes solo operators and pairs entirely.
- SSO sits behind a Custom tier with a twenty-five-licence minimum, which is an unusually high bar for a basic security control.
- Prices render dynamically and several capabilities are per-licence add-ons, so the list price understates what an equipped seat costs, commonly by 40 percent or more.
- Additional numbers are billed per number, which adds up quickly for teams wanting country-local presence in several markets.
- There is no call scoring or playbook adherence layer, so sales coaching still needs a conversation intelligence vendor on top.
Head-to-head comparisons
4 alternativesAircall vs CloudTalk
from 19 euros per user per month billed annually (27 euros monthly)CloudTalk is the closer competitor on shape: similar routing and analytics, numbers in 160-plus countries against Aircall's smaller footprint, four dialer modes including a ten-line parallel dialer as a 39 euro add-on, plus branded caller ID and spam remediation. Aircall counters with 250-plus integrations, a stronger Salesforce CTI, and a more polished product. Choose CloudTalk if dialing throughput and international numbers matter; choose Aircall if integration depth and reliability matter more than dials per hour.
Full Aircall vs CloudTalk comparisonAircall vs Quo (formerly OpenPhone)
from $15 per user per month billed annually ($19 monthly)Quo costs $15 to $35 a seat with no minimum and includes a number in every seat, with a much better shared inbox and texting experience. Aircall starts at $90 a month for three licences and gives you routing, queues, analytics, a dialer, and 250 integrations. Under five people with a conversational phone need, take Quo; five or more with routing and reporting requirements, take Aircall.
Full Aircall vs Quo (formerly OpenPhone) comparisonAircall vs JustCall
from $29 per user per month billed annually, two-seat minimumJustCall bundles more outbound capability for less: a power dialer at $49, a dynamic dialer for speed-to-lead, local presence with number rotation, and conversation intelligence at $89. Aircall has the better integration catalogue, better routing, and a more mature platform. Pick JustCall when the phone is an outbound weapon; pick Aircall when it is the front door for both sales and support.
Full Aircall vs JustCall comparisonAircall vs Kixie
from About $35 per user per month (reported; not published by the vendor)Kixie dials four lines with AI human voice detection and sells a customer-owned local presence pool with free swapping of flagged numbers, all aimed squarely at connect rate, though it does not publish prices. Aircall dials one line at a time but publishes its pricing and integrates with everything. If the job is generating conversations from a list, Kixie wins outright; if the job is running a phone system that a whole company depends on, Aircall wins.
Full Aircall vs Kixie comparisonImplementation & onboarding
- Setup time
- Two to five days for a small team. Numbers provision quickly and integrations are OAuth connections, but IVR trees, routing rules, ring groups, and tag taxonomies deserve a proper design session rather than being improvised.
- Learning curve
- Low for agents and moderate for administrators. The agent app is genuinely simple. Building good routing and a tagging taxonomy that survives contact with a sales team is the part that requires someone to own it.
- Onboarding
- Self-serve signup with a free trial on the published plans. Custom onboarding, API developer support, and an SLA are Custom-tier features requiring a twenty-five-licence commitment.
- Migration notes
- Number porting follows a standard LOA process, typically one to two weeks, and can run in parallel on a temporary number. Contacts arrive through CRM integrations rather than imports. Historical recordings do not migrate from a previous vendor, so export what compliance requires before cancelling. Teams moving from a legacy PBX should plan for the vocabulary change: Aircall has no dial plans or extensions in the traditional sense, and trying to recreate an old PBX design inside it produces a worse result than redesigning the routing from scratch.
Platform, API & security
- Platforms
- Web appmacOS desktopWindows desktopiOSAndroidSalesforce CTI panelChrome extension
- API
- Public REST API and webhooks covering calls, recordings, tags, contacts, and user events. Dedicated API developer support is a Custom-tier entitlement.
- Compliance
- GDPRSOC 2ISO 27001STIR/SHAKEN attestation on US outboundHIPAA arrangements available on enterprise terms
- Data residency
- European and US hosting available given the company's Paris origin and European customer base; specifics are confirmed during signup or the sales process.
- SSO
- Single sign-on is a Custom-tier feature and therefore carries a twenty-five-licence minimum.
- Security notes
- Role-based permissions govern access to recordings, numbers, and configuration. Call recording is configurable, which is how consent obligations in two-party jurisdictions are handled, but the announcement itself remains the caller's responsibility.
Support & resources
- Channels
- Email support on all plansIn-app chatCustom onboarding on the Custom tierService level agreement on the Custom tier
- Documentation
- Extensive knowledge base and developer documentation covering routing, integrations, the API, and number management.
- Community
- Large customer base with an active partner and integration ecosystem; no major independent user forum.
Company
- Founded
- 2014
- Headquarters
- Paris, France, and New York, United States
- Ownership
- Venture-backed
- Founders
- Olivier Pailhes, Jonathan Anguelov, Pierre-Baptiste Bechu, Xavier Durand
- Employees
- Several hundred worldwide, with offices in Paris, New York, Sydney, and Madrid
- Funding
- Roughly $226M raised in total, including a $120M Series D in June 2021 led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management that valued the company above $1B and made it the first unicorn from the eFounders studio.
Funding history
| Round | Amount | Year | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seed and Series A | Not individually disclosed | 2015 to 2018 | Built out of the eFounders startup studio in Paris. |
| Series B | $29M | 2018 | Funded international expansion and the integration catalogue. |
| Series C | $65M | 2020 | Scaled the platform through the shift to distributed work. |
| Series D | $120M | 2021 | Led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management at a valuation above $1B, the first eFounders unicorn. |
Timeline
- 2014Founded in Paris out of the eFounders startup studio, building a cloud phone system designed around integrations rather than hardware.
- 2016Opens a New York office and starts building the connector catalogue that becomes the product's defining asset.
- 2018Raises a $29M Series B and ships deeper Salesforce and HubSpot integrations plus IVR and routing for growing support teams.
- 2020Raises $65M as distributed work makes cloud telephony a default rather than an upgrade; the integration catalogue passes 100 connectors.
- 2021Raises a $120M Series D led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management at a valuation above $1B, becoming eFounders' first unicorn.
- 2024Ships the AI layer with transcription, summaries, and AI Assist features on the Professional plan.
- 2026Sells Essentials at $30 and Professional at $50 per licence annually with a three-licence minimum, plus metered AI Voice and Messaging Agents, on a catalogue past 250 integrations.
Integrations
- Salesforce (CTI)
- HubSpot
- Zendesk
- Intercom
- Pipedrive
- Microsoft Dynamics
- Slack
- Microsoft Teams
- Zapier
- Shopify
- Front
- Gong
- REST API and webhooks
Frequently asked questions
10 questionsHow much does Aircall cost?
Essentials is $30 per licence per month billed annually, or about $40 monthly. Professional is $50 annually, or about $70 monthly. Both require a minimum of three licences, so the real entry cost is $90 or $150 a month. A Custom tier with SSO, an SLA, and API developer support requires at least twenty-five licences. Prices render by region, so confirm your currency during signup.
Does Aircall have a power dialer, and how many lines?
Yes, on the Professional plan, and it is single-line. The Power Dialer works a loaded call list one number at a time with voicemail drop to skip greetings. There is no parallel dialing, no predictive mode, and no answering machine detection. If throughput is the goal, Kixie dials four lines, CloudTalk's parallel dialer runs ten, and Salesfinity runs five with a queueing model built for volume.
Does Aircall support local presence dialing?
Not as a managed capability. You can buy numbers in many countries and choose which number a team dials from, but there is no rotating area-code-matched pool, no automatic rotation to protect caller ID reputation, and no spam remediation service. Teams whose numbers are getting flagged as Spam Risk need Kixie, CloudTalk, PhoneBurner, or Salesfinity instead.
What makes Aircall's integrations different?
Volume and depth. More than 250 native connectors is the largest catalogue in small-business phone, and the Salesforce integration is a real CTI panel with screen pop and in-console dialing rather than a click-to-call link. For teams whose stack already includes Salesforce, HubSpot, Zendesk, or Intercom, this is the single strongest reason to choose Aircall over a cheaper phone.
Does Aircall record and transcribe calls?
Call recording is included from the Essentials tier. AI transcription and summaries arrive with the AI Assist features on Professional, and recordings plus summaries write back to the connected CRM record. There is no call scoring or playbook adherence layer, so genuine sales coaching still requires a conversation intelligence vendor on top.
What do Aircall's AI Voice Agents cost?
Each account gets 50 free AI Voice Agent minutes a month plus 100 bonus minutes at signup, after which minutes are metered with bundles available from 500 to more than 10,000 minutes. AI Messaging Agents include 100 free conversations and are then billed per conversation. Published per-minute rates render dynamically, so get them in writing during signup.
Is there a seat minimum?
Yes, and it matters. Every published plan requires at least three licences, and the Custom tier requires twenty-five. A solo founder or a two-person team cannot buy Aircall at all, which is the main structural reason to look at Quo or CloudTalk instead.
How does Aircall handle call recording consent and compliance?
Recording is configurable per number and per team, which is the mechanism for handling two-party consent states differently from the default, and outbound US calls carry STIR/SHAKEN attestation. GDPR, SOC 2, and ISO 27001 are covered, and HIPAA arrangements are available on enterprise terms. As always, announcing that a call is recorded and maintaining DNC suppression remain the customer's legal responsibility.
Aircall or CloudTalk?
CloudTalk if you need numbers in 160-plus countries, real dialing throughput including a ten-line parallel dialer, branded caller ID, and spam remediation, on a cheaper base seat. Aircall if integration depth, Salesforce CTI, routing sophistication, and platform maturity matter more than dials per hour. They are close on routing and analytics; they diverge sharply on outbound.
What does a fully equipped Aircall seat really cost?
Plan on more than the list price. Independent buyer research repeatedly puts an equipped seat between $70 and $100 a month once you add the Professional tier, additional phone numbers billed per number, AI agent minutes beyond the free allowance, and per-licence add-on capabilities. Model three licences at Professional plus your number and AI usage before comparing against a bundled competitor.
Editorial verdict
Aircall is the safest business phone system a growing team can buy and the wrong tool for a dialing floor. Professional at $50 a licence gives you a genuine Salesforce CTI, 250-plus integrations, smart routing, mandatory call tagging, six months of analytics, and AI transcription, which is the right package for a company where the phone serves both sales and support and needs to plug into everything else. What it does not give you is throughput: one line at a time, no answering machine detection, no local presence rotation, no spam remediation. Add a three-licence minimum, per-number billing, metered AI agents, and SSO stranded behind twenty-five licences, and the effective cost lands well above the sticker. Buy Aircall for reliability and integration depth in a five-to-fifty-person company. If your quarter depends on dials per hour, buy Kixie, CloudTalk, or PhoneBurner instead.
Written by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Awards, when shown, are judged against the published criteria in our methodology.
Awards & badges
1 heldAircall holds 1 award from the SaaSTracker editorial program. Badges may be displayed by the vendor; each embed links back to this profile.
Category Leader · Dialers & Business Phone
“The integration-first cloud phone, wired into more of the small-business stack than any competitor.”
<a href="https://saastracker.org/products/aircall"><img src="https://saastracker.org/badges/embed/aircall/category-leader-summer-2026.svg" width="180" height="180" alt="Aircall: Category Leader, Dialers & Business Phone. SaaSTracker Summer 2026 Awards." /></a>
