Why Is Teams Phone Not More Popular?

In the State of Microsoft Teams 2025, I wrote:, 

“If we take the 320 million monthly active users figure as gospel, the ratio of Teams Phone users is 25% use Teams for some form of calling. For those who use Teams Phone for PSTN calling, the figure drops to just 6.25%. I don’t know what those stats mean, but there’s quite the chasm for a technology, provider, etc. to exploit, surely?”

• 320 million monthly active users of Microsoft Teams
• 80 million Teams Phone users (includes non-PSTN)
• 20 million Teams Phone System subscriptions (includes those with PSTN access)

On top of these figures, analysts remain positive about the potential market growth of Teams Phone. Patrick Watson, Head of Research at Cavell, says that, “Currently only a small proportion of Teams users globally have PSTN telephony enabled,” but “The scope for growth in this area is huge.”

Cavell’s forecasts for North America and Western Europe see the number of telephony enabled Teams users set to reach more than 40 million by 2027.

While this forecast is positive for Teams Phone, that’s still some time away and it’s only theoretical. 

So, why exactly is there a chasm between the huge number of Teams users and the relatively small number of Teams Phone users?

Defining “not more popular” when it comes to Teams Phone

While Teams Phone is included in the E5 license, and Microsoft has previously stated it has 345m in this category, we can confidently say that there is the opportunity for there to be at least 27m Teams Phone users from this license alone.

There’s also the option for Teams Phone to be purchased standalone. If you’re an E3 subscriber, want Teams Phone but don’t need all the other E5 bells and whistles, this is the option you must choose.

Now, Microsoft doesn’t publish these stats, but we can be sure there are some. Even if we make a lowball estimate of 10% of the 27 million who have access via E5, we’re left with a gap of 10 million.

• 27 million Teams Phone System-enabled licenses through E5
• 2.7 million through E3 + Teams Phone 
• Total: 29.7 million low-end estimate of Teams Phone System subscribers
• Actual Microsoft number: 20 million
• Conservative estimated gap: 10 million

This diagram created by Kevin Kieller at enableUC helps depict the difference between the number of Office/Teams/Teams Phone/Teams Phone with PSTN potential subscribers.

His model uses similar forecasting to the above and also includes the figures for Teams Rooms and Teams Premium.

While Teams Phone adoption is increasing, there’s still quite the gap between Phone System users and the potential existing customer base it could penetrate.

Now we’ve defined “not more popular”, let’s dig into the rationale behind why Teams Phone isn’t completely crushing the VoIP market.

1. Teams Phone is “too expensive”

While pricing shouldn’t be subjective, this argument (which is a common one), boils down to not understanding or appreciating how to achieve a higher return on investment when it comes to Teams.

Arguably, Teams Phone is too expensive if you’re not going to use the majority of its features and/or if you’re keeping your existing PBX or cloud telephony solution. Then it becomes a secondary expense to appease some people and provide specialist functionality to Teams users with heavy usage.

Initially, Microsoft Teams was bundled with Office 365 and Microsoft 365 licenses. These were the glory days where everything appeared “free”.

Now, Teams is offered separately in some business and enterprise plans, having been “unbundled” from Microsoft 365.

Teams Phone Pricing (as of 2025):

Teams Phone is included with Microsoft 365 E5 and Office 365 E5 (annual billing).

If you’re not an E5 subscriber, pricing varies:

• Teams Phone Standard: $10 per user/month
• Frontline Workers: $5 per user/month
• With Calling Plan (US/UK/Canada): $17 per user/month
• With Calling Plan (outside US/UK/Canada): $22 per user/month
• With Domestic & International Calling: $34 per user/month
• Teams Rooms Pro: $40 per room/month

Even if you don’t deem this is expensive (and a lot of businesses don’t), it’s complex to get your head around; let alone procure and manage.

Teams Phone Billing Changes

Starting April 1, 2025, monthly billing plans for annual term subscriptions will incur a 5% price increase compared to upfront annual billing.

Oh, and if you want Copilot for Teams Phone, that’s another $30 on top of however you’re consuming Teams Phone.

The bottom line is that if you treat Teams Phone as an expense, it’s just that. But if you dive into the possibilities of Teams Phone—and the wider Teams ecosystem—then you’ll extend the ROI and may change your mind on how expensive Teams Phone is.

Recommend Reading: How To Extend The ROI Of Your Microsoft Teams Investment

2. Not everybody needs PSTN calling

The way we interact with customers, contractors, and colleagues has changed dramatically over the last decade. Even the technology laggards have had a glimpse into the world of asynchronous communication and online meetings, thanks no doubt to the coronavirus pandemic.

Making a PSTN call, without checking someone’s availability, feels intrusive to some worker types. To some generations, the idea of calling someone without knowing if they’re at their desk feels alien. The unproductivity compared to sending a message to check or scheduling an online meeting (with the benefit of video and screen sharing) just doesn’t make sense.

That’s not to say PSTN calling is dead. Far from it. In use cases like outbound sales and customer service, PSTN calling remains crucial. This is where we see the likes of Dynamics 365 Contact Center combined with Teams Phone to make a powerhouse combination.

But there’s no denying we no longer rely on PSTN calling anywhere near as much as we used to. In fact, the International Voice Report shows a decline of 33.1% since 2018.

3. Other solutions exist and integrate just fine

While the rise of Microsoft Teams is incomparable to any collaboration tool before (or after) it, the market plays host to a serious variety of alternatives. 

And you know what? They’re great too. 

What’s more, there’s a ton of VoIP providers that integrate with Teams. That means you can use all the collaboration and ecosystem features of Teams, while choosing a PBX provider of your choice.

This means you benefit from existing bundling and discounts for your cloud PBX functionality while getting all the collaboration features of Teams. The back end is powered by your PBX provider. The front end is Microsoft.

✅ Major cloud PBX providers with Microsoft Teams integration

• RingCentral
• Zoom Phone
• 8×8
• Dialpad
• Nextiva
• Ringover
• Vonage
• NTT
• BT
• AT&T
• Verizon
• Orange Business Services
• Tata Communications
• Singtel
• Deutsche Telekom
• Telstra
• Gamma
• Intrado (now West UC)
• LoopUp
• Enreach
• NFON

4. Even going all-in on Teams doesn’t mean all-in (sometimes)

Take those businesses with call center or contact center functionality, for example.

While Microsoft does offer a native Dynamics 365 Contact Center product, it’s not always the best fit.

There is an entire discussion about when to choose Dynamics 365 Contact Center versus third-party, certified solutions. 

The same is true (that other solutions remain in play) in other aspects of your collaboration estate too. Areas like security and monitoring may require third-party solutions.

While we’ve used the term “unified communications” for years now, there’s rarely a genuine platform where nothing else is in play.

5. Administration is more work (than the current solution)

There is a major bias when migrating from one phone system to another. Especially for PBX admins.

We get it. You’ve spent the last who knows how many years going through moves, adds, and changes and you know it inside out.

Want to do something remotely similar in Teams and it’s a whole new workflow.

Just look at this response on r/MicrosoftTeams in response to “What do you love/hate about Teams Phone”. 

It highlights a resolution, sure. But it’s harder (or at least different) to what this PBX admin is used to. Therefore, it becomes hard(er) work and reflects negatively on Teams Phone.

6. New features take time to go live

This is a general sweeping statement but you can see from the Reddit user below that while new features are always on the Teams Phone roadmap, users and admins need these now.

Like the point above, where administration of Teams Phone requires more or different effort, waiting for a feature you once had seems counterproductive. As a result, Teams Phone often gets viewed as incomplete or lacking feature parity.

While it’s hard to argue against this, it falls into the category of a new way of working. PBXs of the past were viewed as complete. But they were limited because of this. 

If you needed a new feature, you needed to buy and install a new piece of hardware. Today, cloud PBXs are constantly updated in a SaaS-first style.

7. Teams Phone awareness is fairly low

Considering the 20-some million users of Teams Phone for PSTN calling, it often gets overshadowed by more statement numbers like 320 million monthly active users of Teams.

Likewise, the layperson is unaware of modern voice telephony behind the scenes. They just make phone calls using the easiest method possible. This means they often choose the method that’s been with them the longest (e.g. whatever handset is on their desk).

In many cases, Teams users don’t even know they can use Teams for external calls—even those who are Teams Phone enabled.

Without proactive communication, or taking away the old PBX functionality, how can we expect users to self-adopt Teams Phone?

❌ We can’t.

Often, the only way to raise awareness of Teams Phone inside your business is to kick on with your planned migration. Which leads us to our final point…

8.A full migration is quite a lot of work

When migrating to Teams voice, you’ve got a lot of moving parts, a lot of stakeholders to appease, and a ton of users to convince it’s worthwhile. 

And then there’s the technical side of things:

• Auditing existing phone systems
• Planning for migration
• Rolling out test users
• Running a full pilot
• Porting numbers
• Addressing issues on go-live

Look, we get it. We’ve been around the block a few times when it comes to Teams Phone implementations. But that means we’ve done the hard work for you and learned the lessons to streamline your migration.

Before making the switch to Microsoft Teams for voice, it’s crucial to conduct a pilot program

to ensure the right fit and optimal outcomes. 

Cloud Revolution, the Microsoft partner of the year 2023 (and finalist 22, 24), offers a comprehensive solution to facilitate and manage your Teams Phone pilot.

We take care of everything for you:

• Expert Facilitation: Our experienced team will guide you through the entire pilot program, ensuring best practices are followed and accurate results are obtained.
• Goal-Oriented Approach: We work with you to define clear objectives aligned with your organization’s needs, providing a solid foundation for the pilot program and justifying its importance.
• Leadership Buy-in: We help secure sponsorship from key stakeholders throughout your organization, fostering participation and diverse perspectives from different departments.
• Resource Allocation: We assist in allocating the necessary time, resources, and budget for the pilot program, ensuring its success and seamless integration with your existing projects.
• Defined Use Cases: We collaborate with you to identify and test the specific use cases relevant to your UC platform evaluation, ranging from conferencing and collaboration to mobility and third-party integrations.
• Hardware Evaluation: As part of the pilot, we provide access to and gather feedback on hardware devices like handsets, headsets, and conference room systems, ensuring comprehensive assessment and user familiarity.
• Microsoft Support: Throughout the pilot, we leverage Microsoft’s dedicated resources, including training classes and technical documentation, to address any questions or unexpected situations that may arise.
• Analysis and Implementation Planning: Our pilot program committee analyzes the outcomes, carefully considering any limitations or integration challenges.
• Next Steps: Based on the findings, we collaborate with you to define the next steps for a successful full implementation plan.

Interested in getting started with Teams Phone?

Learn about our Teams Phone pilot program here.