It seems like Zoom calls are the rage currently with everything that’s going on in the world right now. If you’re anything like me, you may be wondering how much using Zoom in South Africa will cost you…
It is free to set up and use a Basic Zoom account in South Africa. If you upgraded to the Pro account, it will cost you R225 per month (R2250 per year). A business account costs R300 per month, while a Zoom United Business account would cost you R520 per month.
If you are simply attending a Zoom meeting you don’t need to create an account so the above prices will not be applicable to you. What will affect you, is the cost of that data you will use when on a Zoom call. I’ll discuss those costs a little later in this article.
Here is a full breakdown of what Zoom costs in South Africa (Excluding the hidden data costs which I share later in this article:
| Package | Per Month | Per Year |
| Basic | Free | Free |
| Pro | R225 | R2250 |
| Business | R300 | R3000 |
| Zoom United Business | R525 | R5250 |
If you are the meeting creator or host, the Zoom Basic account does have a few limitations, particularly if you’re using it to run your business. Most people in South Africa would never need to upgrade and pay for a Zoom account.
The free Zoom account offers you unlimited 1 on 1 meetings but if you need to host group meetings, those are limited to 40 minutes.
When do you need to pay for Zoom?
Group meetings can sometimes drap on longer than you’d like and once you hit the 40 minute threshold, your call will be cut (I speak from experience here, they don’t give you any leeway).
If you need your group Zoom calls to go on longer than 40 minutes, you would need to upgrade to at least the Pro plan which costs R220 per month or R2250 per year.
Despite being in South Africa, Zoom does charge for their premium account is US Dollars. So in USD terms, you’re looking at $14.99 per month or $149.90 for a full year.
If the vast majority of people won’t need to upgrade to the Pro account, even few will need the Business or United Business account.
Unless you need much larger meeting rooms (300 people as opposed to 100) and the added security benefits of Single Sign-On, these two packages are overkill for the average South African.
This leads me to the second question that I always get asked very often when it comes to Zoom meetings…
How much data does a zoom call use?
One of the concerns that people have with doing business online when using Zoom, even on the Basic account (Which is free) is how much data are they going to use. The cost of data is often forgotten when trying to calculate what Zoom costs in South Africa.
This is how much data a 1 on1 Zoom meeting uses:
| Stream Quality | Download | Upload | Total |
| High | 270MB per hour | 270MB per hour | 540MB per hour |
| 720p | 540MB per hour | 540MB per hour | 1.08GB per hour |
| 1080p | 810MB per hour | 810MB per hour | 1.62GB per hour |
It is important to remember that when you are on a Zoom call, you’re not only downloading the video and audio stream of the person you are in the meeting with, but you are also having to upload your audio and video stream to send to them.
You can limit the amount of data you use by decreasing your video quality as much as possible and also turning off your web cams unless they are necessary.
When you’re in a group Zoom meeting, the data usage for this type of call increases to:
| Stream Quality | Download | Upload | Total |
| High | 450MB per hour | 360MB per hour | 810MB per hour |
| 720p | 675MB per hour | 675MB per hour | 1.35GB per hour |
| 1080p | 1.2MB per hour | 1.2MB per hour | 2.4GB per hour |
The same principle applies on group call about keeping your data usage down as much as possible.