Nextiva vFax review

Encrypted online faxing integrated directly with your inbox

Nextiva vFax review
(Image: © Nextiva)

Top Ten Reviews Verdict

This is a good solution for companies whose needs are set to evolve with time, and that need faxes to be sent using an encrypted service. There’s great customer care, making this a good solution for companies who do not have an in-house IT support team. The scalable packages mean this service is a good option for a growing company.

Pros

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    Customer service available over the phone, email, and live chat

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    Flexible pricing solutions for all business sizes

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    Help with switching from your current supplier

Cons

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    No API solutions

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    No free plans after the initial free trial

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    No international numbers

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Nextiva vFax is one of the best online fax services you can buy right now. Its faxing solution enables users to send and receive faxes without having to invest in costly fax machines or other hardware. The system is integrated within the users’ normal email system and can be used both to send and receive faxes. Users can choose from setting up a new fax number, or they can transfer their existing number to the service with assistance from the company’s customer care team. Plans start at just $4.95 per month but can be scaled to suit organizations of all sizes.

Faxes sent and received using the system are encrypted with 256-bit SSL encryption, making it a secure solution for all companies, including those operating in sensitive sectors such as healthcare and law. Faxes are stored online to ensure documents are not lost after they are transferred.

Nextiva vFax review: Features

  • Documents can be accessed through any authorized device
  • Users can keep their existing fax number
Nextiva: Key features

Deployment: Cloud, Web, Email

Training: Online

Support: Live Chat, Email, Phone

Mobile apps: No

All faxes can be delivered directly to an email inbox, but users can also set up text alerts to be notified when a fax is received. Extra fax numbers can be added at any time to scale for companies’ needs.

Nextiva’s interface comes across as more modern and user-friendly than other competitors. The flexibility offered by its plans is also a real asset for those smaller businesses who need to stay agile.

If you need to find a fax on the go, the good thing here is that all documents can be accessed through any authorized device and that all the faxes are saved in one place, making them much easier to find.

Nextiva vFax review: Design and usability

  • Web-based service requires flash
  • Cannot be added into custom in-house application

The web-based interface is user friendly with a limited amount of options, making it easy for everyone in the organization to navigate. There are some basic document editing tools that allow users to rotate and crop scanned documents before faxing them when using the web-based system.

Faxes can be sent to multiple recipients at the same time, which can be helpful for marketing professionals.  Faxes can be emailed to users, but instead of being sent through as an attachment an email is sent containing a link to the fax on the provider’s website. Users can set up a specific email address that is dedicated to sending and receiving faxes or can discuss having those sent to an existing email account with customer service.

Nextiva vFax review: Performance

  • Supports a variety of file types
  • Flexible notification options

The level of customer care is an excellent asset here but beyond this, the interface itself is relatively user friendly, and users can upload a wide variety of file types, including .pdf, .txt, .rtf, .doc, .xls, .ppt, .png, .jpg, .eps, and more.

Users can access the online interface to track whether or not faxes were successfully sent and received, and can view all incoming and outgoing messages to remove the need to print every fax, unless required. If users would prefer to receive and send faxes by email, there are options to receive notifications by email, a link is sent to the user who can then view the fax online.

Faxes can be sent by email too and will then appear on the account’s online log. There is also the possibility to be notified by text message when a fax is received, if required. This can be very helpful for businesses that require a lot of time away from the office. For email notifications, a copy of the fax is delivered as an attachment, which can then be saved onto a CMS as required, and a separate copy is saved online too.

Should you buy Nextiva vFax?

Depending on the quantity of faxes that companies need to send, Nextiva can be a cost-effective solution for sending and receiving faxes without having to invest in expensive equipment or having extra phone lines installed. Users can benefit from a free 30-day trial, which offers a good chance to ensure the service is the best option for their requirements.

Customer care is easily reached either over the phone, by email, or on live chat via the website, which is hugely beneficial for companies who do not have their own IT support team for any technical queries. Help is also on hand to help businesses to transfer from their current provider, and to add or remove extra numbers, or to change plans, as needed.

The online interface also allows users to keep track of which faxes have been safely delivered or did not get through. Faxes can be sent to up to five recipients at a time too, a useful option for most companies who use faxes, with most traditional machines only being able to process one recipient at a time.

One downside of the service is that you cannot sign up for an international number and, while users can receive faxes from all over the world, they are limited to sending faxes within the US, Canada and US overseas territories. There also is no option for a toll-free number to be set up at this time, which could be an issue for some business models.

Other online fax systems to consider

Nextiva vFax is one of the best online fax services you can use in 2020, but there's a lot of competition. Some of these might be a better option for your business. Click the links to read the review:

OpenText digs deep into the analytics; RingCentral Fax has great Windows integration; flexibility is a strength of MetroFax; eFax has private and lifetime archiving for your faxes; with MyFax you can tag and search your faxes; fax-sending to the US and Canada is FaxZero's USP; SRFax can schedule your faxes and archive them as well; with HelloFax you don't need any equipment other than a PC; and Fax.com gives you 30 days of free storage.

With so many online fax services to choose from it can be hard to know which is best for your business. We've compared them all in our guide: Best online fax services 2020 to help you decide.

Gina Clarke

Gina Clarke has worked in journalism for over a decade for titles such as The Daily Mail, The Sun and Forbes. She began her career in BBC radio and now specialises in subjects such as financial technology and women’s health. She has written for the Top Ten Reviews brand on a number of different and varied topics.