Any experience with Unifi Talk?

VoIP
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I’m looking to upgrade a small network / VoIP solution for a small non-profit. Router, 4 Access points (It’s a large space), 5 phones, 2 incoming lines, and about 20 devices connected to the network. Personally, I run Unifi at my home. and really like it for networking. I don’t have any experience with Unifi Talk. Has anyone used it? If so, what is your experience?

I really like the one interface Unifi gives you with the free chat support.

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Welcome to the forums, I have not had any experience with it, hope someone here has some more insight to offer.

3

It works remarkably well. Newer UniFi firmware added QoS but the smart queue seems to get it done. I have had trouble with other VoIP phones on different gear without QoS. Really cool that you just need one phone number subscription (2 for you it seems) for all the devices. I wish the speakerphone was louder but the voice quality is sharp.

Pro tip - Use the automated call attendant to force incoming calls to pick an option like ring all extensions. Spammers won’t hit a button typically. Drastically reduced the unnecessary calls.

4

Thanks ryan_g, I was chatting with support and my impression is that a phone number can handle multiple calls simultaneously. Is this true? That could be a real benefit.

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Yep. You have to buy the more expensive phone extensions although it looks to be the only option now. The set up I did wasn’t very big, 5 extensions including one in another state work all on the same number. Saves at least $75/mo and they can intercom the remote user now which is cool. Call transcription is useful too.

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Thanks Piper. A solid and simple solution is what we need. Nothing complicated

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Thanks for the clarification, Ryan. Sounds like we can eliminate one line. Just need it to prevent busy signals.

1 Like
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I am using my Yealink phones with Unifi talk they are working great. Just had to buy 1 Talk devise to get it to start the setup but the ATA worked for that.

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Thanks for the tip net_geek

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Yes we have a great deal of experience with unifi talk.

More than a dozen customers on talk. Big and small. Even a pharmacy with 15k minutes per month used. (We have since retired unifi talk at that location.

I have some new and used talk phones in stock I can let go cheep for your non profit if your interested. (Call us our number is at qpctech.com)

Protips for talk:

  1. Use email aliases for the client.

a. We have an email clients@qpctech…. And we make an alias for each. Client. This way when the bills come or two factors are required we can have one shares mailbox for this administration… but at the same time it is distinct for each client.

b. Make sure you enroll the talk subscription from the customers email alias (not your technicians log in. Else you will end up with multiple subscriptions billing to the same email. ) unifi tall bills are not at all detailed so it becomes difficult to determine who gets what bill… looking at the email to field is the only way to track this.

  1. use the advanced call routing feature. This fixes an issue where the system would not reregester with the coup provider for hours after an outage. The advance call routing seems to reregester with the system alot faster.

  2. take the time to enroll the business attestation and cnam registration. Don’t forget to assign the registration to the phone numbers. This adds caller ID to outbound calls.

  3. the larger phones have the same layout as the smaller screens. They are handy for viewing the unifi cameras on a larger screen but there is not much benefit in the talk app for the larger screen.

  4. set the fail over number for a after hours cellphone… if Internet is out to the customers site their phone will light up with all inbound calls from all lines including the fax lines.

  5. ata works pretty good for faxes but if it stops working just restart (power cycle) the ata. No need to reconfigure it.

  6. autoattendents are easy to set up.

a. The AI voices are pretty good the male voices sound less creepy then the female voices IMHO.

b. For weird names you can add extra vowels to make it pronounce properly.

c. Punctuation can be added here or there for pauses and to correct the sentence cadence if it doesn’t sound natural.

d. The scheduling is kind of weird… seems like it’s backwards… hard to explain I just remember it being weird to set up initially.

  1. wifi works pretty great for one or two phones… on a high vacancy AP. in healthcare where there are 5 laptops on an app with 4 phones there were issues.

  2. teleport phone into the talk app from remote sites works great. And is pretty easy to set up.

  3. call recording and transcript is pretty awesome. Consider putting a storage device in your or udmpro/SE for storing VM and phone transcripts.

(One day it would be fun to train an AI that learns from the phone calls and can answer sales questions based on overhearing sales answers in call transcripts)

  1. the soft phone smartphone app feature was terrible I tried it but couldn’t make it work for me. (It might be better now.)

  2. 3000 minutes per $9.99 phone number are pooled. So if you need more minutes you just add a dummy number. (Or you could get the $29 subscription now which is unlimited)

  3. caller ID is not fantastic on the $9.99 plan. Supposedly better on the $29.99 plan.

The main limiation compared to a cloud voip solution is that the talk app runs locally on your ISP… if you have ISP outages you will have phone outage also.

I’d be happy to get you going on talk including supply phones. I have several in stock… and we have a different voip solution that we are going to market with now days.

12

I am embarrassed with the number of spelling mishaps in the previous post. but it was too long ago for me to edit it. (tried to write it from an IPAD)

here is a fixed version of the post for readablity.

Yes we have a great deal of experience with unifi talk.

More than a dozen customers on talk. Big and small. Even a pharmacy with 15k minutes per month used. (We have since retired Unifi talk at that location.

I have some new and used talk phones in stock I can let go cheep for your non profit if your interested. (Call us our number is at qpctech.com)

Protips for talk:

  1. Use email aliases for the client - We have an email customers@qpctech…. And we make an alias for each client. This way when the bills come or two factors are required we can have one shares mailbox for this administration… but at the same time it is distinct for each client.
  2. Make sure you enroll the talk subscription from the customers email alias (not your technicians log in. Else you will end up with multiple subscriptions billing to the same email. ) Unifi tall bills are not at all detailed so it becomes difficult to determine who gets what bill… looking at the email to field is the only way to track this.
  3. In the call settings use the advanced call routing feature. This was added in 2022 or so and it fixes an issue where the system would not re-register with the SIP provider for hours after an outage. The advance call routing seems to re-register with the system a lot more frequently.
  4. Take the time to enroll the business attestation and cnam registration. Don’t forget to assign the registration to the phone numbers. This adds caller ID to outbound calls.
  5. The larger phones have the same layout as the smaller screens. They are handy for viewing the Unifi cameras on a larger screen but there is not much benefit in the talk app for the larger screen. oh yeah BTW you can view your doorbell camera with the phone… that is a benefit to someone like at a church office who wants to see expected delivery’s but might be uncomfortable answering the door if they are in the church alone.
  6. Set the fail over number for a after hours cellphone… if Internet is out to the customers site their phone will light up with all inbound calls from all lines including the fax lines.
  7. ATA works pretty good for faxes but if it stops working just restart (power cycle) the ATA. No need to reconfigure it.
  8. Autoattendents are easy to set up. The AI voices are pretty good the male voices sound less creepy then the female voices IMHO. For weird names you can add extra vowels to make it pronounce properly. Punctuation can be added here or there for pauses and to correct the sentence cadence if it doesn’t sound natural. The scheduling is kind of weird… seems like it’s backwards… hard to explain I just remember it being weird to set up initially
  9. Connecting Talk Phones over WIFI works pretty great for one or two phones… on a high vacancy AP. In a healthcare office where there were 5 laptops and 4 phones on the same UAP6 Lite there were issues.
  10. Teleport phone into the talk app from remote sites works great. And is pretty easy to set up. clever integration with the webcam to set the teleport using a QRCode.
  11. Call recording and transcript is pretty awesome. Consider putting a storage device in your or udmpro/SE for storing VM and phone transcripts. (One day it would be fun to train an AI that learns from the phone calls and can answer sales questions based on overhearing sales answers in call transcripts.)
  12. the soft phone smartphone app feature was terrible I tried it but couldn’t make it work for me. (It might be better now.)
  13. 3000 minutes per $9.99 phone number are pooled. So if you need more minutes you just add a dummy number. (Or since 2024 when they added the $29 subscription you can get unlimited and allegedly better Caller ID information.)
  14. Caller ID is not fantastic on the $9.99 plan. Supposedly better on the $29.99 plan.
  15. Address books are stored in the phone locally. when we reset the phones the address book would also be cleared… this drove our pharmacists crazy as they were trying to build a caller ID database using the address book and when i would have to reprovision a phone it would clear the local address book.
  16. The main limitation compared to a cloud VoIP solution is that the talk app runs locally on your ISP… if you have ISP outages you will have phone outage also.
  17. Performance over Starlink was passable for Voice but ATA barely worked with dialup for Credit Card Reader (this was a fools errand i know… but it had to work at this customer.

I’d be happy to get you going on talk I would even share my supply of phones. I have several in stock… We have a different VoIP solution that we are going to market with now days but this is still a great choice for a small business who needs occasional phone use.