Viber : Free Messages & Calls

Viber lets you give and receive free VoIP phone calls and cross-platform push text messages

After reaching great success for a long while in iOS, Viber Inc. has finally released Viber for Android. Viber is an app that lets you both give and receive voicecalls using VoIP over 3G/4G or WiFi connection. What’s more, it contains a cross-platform push text messages service that lets you send and receive text messages from your contacts around the world. Let’s see how it does work.

First time you download the app, it asks you for permission to access your phonebook. It automatically integrates your phonebook to Viber contact list, and identify who of them is already using Viber. Anyway, if they aren’t using them you can send an invitation via SMS, Whatsapp or other similar services.

While the contacts you want to give a call to, don’t have Viber installed, you can call them, send SMS (or other messaging service), send them an e-mail or chat by using Windows Live. Once they’ve installed Viber, you will be able to call them through Viber or send them a push text messages. That easy.

Since it’s a service that uses your phone connection, its performance depends on the quality of the connection. If you’re over 3G/4G and you’re moving, you will probably notice bad line or you won’t even be able to connect. Over WiFi it works great, except for a minimum delay on the line and echo. Regarding quality sound, it isn’t perfect, but it’s the best quality sound we’ve reported in this kind of apps.

Push text messages works properly. It notifies when the messages is sent and delivered. There are some catches though: you can’t send either media files nor your own location. What’s more, it doesn’t support emojis. And last but not least, chat group isn’t supported either.

Viber is set in a good-looking white&purple layout and user-friendly interface. A tab bar on the bottom includes: “recents” (call log), “contacts” (list), “keypad” (dialer), “messages”, “more” (settings, about and sharing). From settings you can choose your preferences about notifications sounds, vibration, icons, and much more.

Viber ins’t perfect, but it has been one of the most successful apps in iOS and it’s no coincidence. Viber is based on VoIP, a real revolution concerning calling that allows you to call to contacts from around the World and, this is the best part, for FREE. Must have.