Residential VoIP (Voice over Internet protocol) enables you to make phone calls over the Internet from your home. This has made it possible for people to have several advanced calling features installed in their home phones at little or no extra cost. Their cost of calling too has come down by one-third to half.
Among the special features that come with a VoIP phone are caller ID, call waiting, three-way calling and call forwarding. The most important facility is number retention. This is especially useful for those who don’t want to lose their numbers when they move from one city to another. Besides this, VoIP phones can be configured to receive all facilities that come with web-based administration.
A VoIP phone, however, needs to be connected to a broadband line. This is important because broadband lines provide the necessary bandwidth to route voice traffic. Low bandwidth pipes not only suffer from traffic congestion, but also affect voice quality.