Amazon Chime vs Zoom: Which Is Better for Businesses?

Amazon Chime: A Complete Guide to Features and PricingAmazon Chime is a communications service from AWS designed for online meetings, video conferencing, calls, chat, and collaboration. It integrates with AWS identity and management tools and positions itself as a secure, scalable alternative for businesses that want a cloud-native meeting solution. This guide covers what Chime offers, how its features work, pricing models, pros and cons, real-world use cases, and tips for deployment and administration.

What is Amazon Chime?

Amazon Chime is a unified communications service that provides audio and video conferencing, screen sharing, messaging, and file sharing across desktop and mobile devices. Unlike traditional on-premises systems, Chime runs in AWS’s cloud, which allows for global scalability, integration with other AWS services (such as IAM and CloudTrail), and a pay-for-use model.

Core features

• Meeting and video conferencing
  • HD video and audio for group meetings.
  • Screen sharing, presenter controls, and layout options.
  • Meeting recordings (with storage in Amazon S3 when configured).
• Chat and messaging
  • Persistent 1:1 and group chat rooms.
  • File attachment and sharing within chats.
  • Message search and history.
• Calling
  • Inbound/outbound PSTN calling (with optional phone numbers).
  • VoIP calls between Chime users.
  • Call routing and voicemail features.
• Scheduling and calendar integration
  • Integrates with Microsoft Outlook and Google Calendar for meeting scheduling and join links.
  • Meeting join from calendar invites or within the Chime client.
• Security and compliance
  • Integration with AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) and AWS Directory Service.
  • Data encryption in transit and at rest (depending on configuration).
  • Audit logs via AWS CloudTrail for administrative oversight.
• Administration and analytics
  • Admin console for user provisioning, account settings, and usage reports.
  • Usage metrics and meeting diagnostics to troubleshoot call quality.
• SDKs and integrations
  • Chime SDK for building real-time communications into web and mobile apps (voice, video, screen share).
  • APIs for account management and automation.

How Amazon Chime works (technical overview)

At a high level, Amazon Chime uses AWS-managed services to handle signaling, media processing, and storage. The Chime client (desktop, mobile, or web) connects to Chime backend services for account and meeting management, and uses WebRTC or proprietary protocols for real-time audio/video streams. When recording is enabled, meeting media can be stored in Amazon S3 and optionally processed or analyzed using other AWS services (Transcribe, Rekognition, etc.). The Chime SDK provides lower-level building blocks (signaling, media, and device management) so developers can embed meetings and calls directly into custom applications.

Pricing models

Amazon Chime offers a few pricing approaches depending on how you use it:

• Free tier
  • Basic Chime functionality such as 1:1 meetings, chat, and file sharing may be available at no charge for limited features.
• Per-user plans
  • Chime previously offered per-user subscription tiers (Basic, Plus, Pro) with different feature sets (Pro typically includes larger meetings, advanced features).
• Pay-as-you-go (Chime SDK and PSTN)
  • For developers using the Chime SDK, pricing is usage-based (per minute of audio/video, per GB of storage/transfer).
  • PSTN calling and phone numbers are billed per-minute and per-number (rates vary by country/region).
• Additional AWS charges
  • If you record meetings to S3, standard S3 storage and request costs apply.
  • Using other AWS services for transcription, analytics, or media processing will incur their respective charges.

Pricing specifics can change and may differ by region; organizations should consult the official AWS pricing pages for current rates and use the AWS Pricing Calculator to estimate costs for expected usage.

Comparison with competitors

Pros and cons

Common use cases

• Internal and external company meetings, remote interviews, webinars.
• Embedding real-time communications in customer-facing apps (via Chime SDK) — e.g., telehealth, virtual classrooms, contact centers.
• Voice calling with PSTN for distributed workforce.
• Secure collaboration for organizations using AWS for other services and wanting centralized identity and auditing.

Deployment & admin tips

• Integrate with your identity provider (AWS Directory Service or SAML) for single sign-on and centralized user management.
• Use CloudTrail and Chime audit logs to monitor usage and security events.
• Configure meeting recordings to S3 buckets with lifecycle policies to control storage costs.
• Test PSTN dialing plans and region-specific rates before wide deployment.
• Use the Chime SDK if you need custom UI/UX or to embed into existing web/mobile products.

Troubleshooting common issues

• Poor audio/video quality: check network bandwidth, enable adaptive bitrate, use AWS regions closer to users.
• Users can’t join meetings: verify calendar integration and meeting links, ensure users are provisioned and have proper permissions.
• High storage costs from recordings: set S3 lifecycle rules to move old recordings to cheaper storage tiers or delete after retention period.

Final notes

Amazon Chime is best suited for organizations already invested in AWS or developers who want to embed real-time communication features into applications using the Chime SDK. Pricing flexibility and deep AWS integrations are its main advantages; organizations should evaluate PSTN and storage costs relative to usage patterns and compare feature parity with established competitors.