The year 2023 brought us a revolution and completely altered how we live. To thrive amidst the pandemic, we had to find new transforming ways. Some saw this as a challenge to find new ways to live and not just survive, at first.

A recent report shows that in just the first quarter of 2023, the popular video conferencing application “Zoom” gained over 2.5 million users. The video-first culture has been adopted by a wide array of companies around the world, and it is predicted that by the year 2025, the market for the online conferencing app will be worth $20 billion.

Today, more companies are interested in developing their apps because of the success of the Zoom app. We will cover all the details regarding the development of video conferencing software such as Zoom in this article.

Zoom App: Everything You Need to Know

Eric Yuan, a Cisco Systems engineer, discovered this cloud online conferencing app in 2012. The main goal of the application was to provide people with the ability to meet others virtually by video, audio, or both, as they desired. More than half of the Fortune 500 companies used this app in 2020, and they still use it to this day. This app is compatible with iOS, Mac, Android, Linux, Windows, and many others.

Calls can be made free of charge for up to 40 minutes, while longer conversations will require an upgrade to $14.99/monthly. Entry-level upgrades allow 100 people to participate at once in a conferencing call and for 24 hours.

How Zoom Video Conferencing Makes Money

By describing these revenue models, we tell you how Zoom makes money:

Meeting via Zoom

Video calls can be made via the Zoom mobile app, and the app’s main function is remote video calling. Users won’t be charged if the call doesn’t last longer than 40 minutes. Using the annual plan will cost $12.49/month for users who wish to hold uninterrupted meetings lasting more than 40 minutes. The monthly charge is $14.99 for meetings lasting more than 40 minutes. You can have a Zoom-like app for your business and have a revenue model similar to theirs if you so choose. Freemium is the name of this kind of revenue model.

The Zoom Room and Workspace

Besides offering video meetings, Zoom also provides companies with the option of renting physical conference rooms. Customers are offered hardware and physical space to conduct conferences without having to worry about how to manage them. Even a professional service unit ensures that conference rooms run smoothly. It offers hardware support for conference rooms through partnerships with hardware manufacturers. A monthly fee is charged for Zoom Rooms and Workspaces (or an annual fee, if you choose that option).

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Zoom on Phones

Video calling is not available in this feature. Instead, it is designed for users who only wish to use voice calling. The main product includes tools that can be used to enable video calling. Zoom Phone comes with features like HD audio conversations that are secure, voice mailboxes, and call recording, as well as AI-based call management, automated call attendants, and IVR tools, which make the calling experience seamless. Their subscription model is monthly for this product.

Subscription-Based Business Model for Zoom

Basic Zoom for Free

• Meeting on a personal basis
• Up to 100 participants are welcome
• A maximum of 40 minutes for group meetings
• Meetings one-on-one are unlimited

$14.99/month for Zoom Pro

• Can accommodate up to 100 participants
• Increasing participant numbers to 1,000 (scalable)
• A 30-hour meeting for a group
• The Social Media Stream
• Cloud recording of 1 GB (per license)

$19.99/month for Zoom Business

• You can host up to 300 people
• Increasing participant numbers to 1,000 (scalable)
• Log in with a single account
• Transcripts of recorded meetings
• Domain management
• Branding for companies
• A premium toll and call out option is available through India Audio
• You get all the features in Pro, plus more.

$19.99/month for Zoom Enterprise

• Organize a meeting for up to 500 people
• Storage on the cloud is unlimited
• The Customer Success Manager is dedicated to the customers
• Transcripts of recorded meetings
• URI of the corporate site
• Sign-on through a single account
• Cloud services in hybrid mode
• Using REST APIs
• The remaining features of the business
• Add on for Indian subcontinent – Premium Toll & Call Out

Online Video Conferencing Apps: Basic Features

A majority of apps are the same, and the features they have to offer to their users are what make them different from the rest. Zoom, for instance, has several essential features to make use of.

• Use your email address or social media profile to register
• Creating and managing profiles
• Utilize a virtual background when video conferencing
• Attend a video meeting while chatting with the team
• Take notes during the videoconference
• Watch the video preview of the pre-call
• Video conference file sharing
• Screen sharing
• Keep starred contacts, channels, and messages at the top of your list
• Notification of upcoming meetings via push notifications
• Web browsers and Google calendar can be integrated with the application
• Making and receiving calls with a softphone
• Keypad for making PSTN and internal calls
• History of video meetings and video calls
• Listen to and manage your voicemails
• Themes can be changed
• You can call your regular contacts with an instant video call
• Contact ID’s can be managed and added to meetings
• Cloud-based recording of video calls

• Check your social media networks to see if anyone is using the video calling app
• You can invite someone to chat or video call by email using the ‘Invite me’ feature
• Join a public or private channel
• Set up meetings
• Meetings can be scheduled according to availability

A Video Chat and Conferencing App Could Add These Advanced Features

High-Resolution Cameras

A 4K camera resolution is recommended for video calling apps because seeing a hazy distorted face can be frustrating.

Distance Management

Large enterprises having multiple VC units will find this feature useful. Using distance or remote management in that scenario, the users can adjust the settings without traveling from room to room.

Noise Blocker

The sound of people talking or typing on their keyboards, children crying, car traffic, and other background noises can distract you from video meetings. It’s possible to keep distracting noises out of the meeting with Noise Blocking technology. It mutes the microphone automatically when it does not recognize a real person talking.

Acoustic fences are another option for reducing noise. Microphones are used to create a virtual boundary around the meeting area, allowing a virtual boundary to be built. This prevents sound from escaping the meeting area.

The Push Notification System

For the Zoom-like app, this is a critical feature since it allows people to easily get notifications when they miss calls, receive messages, or receive updates.

Frame-automation

Manual framing is not necessary with this feature. A moderator who has to zoom in and out of the video would waste time. There is an automatic adjustment of the view here so that all the people in the picture can see it.

Encrypting of Data

Video-conferencing apps are used more and more frequently by businesses, and they all prioritize security over anything else. It’s best to provide your users with the assurance that their data is safe when building trust among them for your videoconferencing apps. Is end-to-end encryption the best way of accomplishing this? Only those involved in the exchange can see the exchanges and discussions.

Virtual Backgrounds & Green Screens

With the help of this functionality, the video conference host can use a background image or green screen to showcase their presentation. Virtual background images will make the experience more appealing for the presenters if they use attractive backgrounds.

Forum/Chat

A chat room is an important feature for online meeting apps, and MOTS video conferencing apps restrict users to only those with invite codes, which is a great feature. The video call can only be joined by those with the invite code. A user with the invite code can join a virtual chat room as soon as it has been created and join the ongoing webinar or meeting.

Tech Stack for Zoom Video Conferencing App

To handle thousands of calls (with no delay) without dropping calls, Zoom uses Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, and its servers. Zoom is capable of providing services in two ways:

Website-based apps

• Various APIs like MediaStream, RTC DataChannel, RTC PeerConnection
• JavaScript, HTML, and CSS for the frontend
• Vue, Angular JS, and React JS are used for the back end

Android and iOS Native Applications

• Ionic and Android frameworks
• A developers kit for Android, a developer kit for iOS, and a developer kit for Apple Code;
• Applications for iOS and Android use Objective C and Swift, respectively, while Java and Kotlin are used for iOS.
• You can integrate third-party APIs such as Vonage Video API, Twilio, PubNub, and CometChat.

Scripts by Turnkey

An alternative to mobile app development services and web-based applications is the turnkey script. It conforms to brand standards in terms of brand identity. Zoom clone scripts provide a back-end admin panel as well as a user interface on the front-end. It takes a long time and costs a lot of money to develop a platform from scratch. A turnkey solution saves time and offers efficiency.

Developing An Online Video Conferencing App like Zoom: Costing

Video-calling apps are costed based on several factors, including:

• Developer’s hourly rate
• Conceptualization & Design
• Features
• Platforms available

Among all of these, the hourly development rates vary from location to location, and these impacts the overall development cost of the app the most. In the USA, Eastern Europe, and India, the hourly development rate, if you hire a hybrid app developer is a lot higher.

To be more specific, the cost of developing a video conferencing app with basic features will likely be between $20000 and $55000. If the Indian region is chosen for development, the cost for an app with advanced features would be between $45000 and $80000.

The Bottom Line

The rise of video conferencing mobile apps has certainly been one of the big changes we all noticed amid the pandemic. Multinational firms with multiple offices around the world used these apps more frequently in the past. Even small business owners have adopted these apps post-pandemic, as the situation was completely different during the pandemic. Now is the perfect time to hop on the bandwagon and develop an online conferencing app!

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