Skype has long been the standard when it comes to video streaming platforms for individual and business purposes; the COVID-19 pandemic changed it completely. 2021 has been the year of Zoom as it took over Skype’s fame.
In 2020, the Zoom app was downloaded 485 million times and turned out to be the world’s most used video conference platform. Today, Zoom registers over 3.3 trillion annual meeting minutes and with 300 million daily meeting participants.
Being a go-to option for people to connect with each other, Zoom is used by online tutors too. But is that the only reason why it is used for online tutoring?
No, the app has seen the highest growth in the online tutoring industry and is replacing Skype, Google, meet, and other video conferencing solutions. But why? That’s exactly what we are going to address in this blog.
Skype VS. Zoom Comparison For Online Classroom Learning
It is known that Zoom was specially designed for video conferencing, meetings, and online teaching. Whereas Skype is a great piece of software made for international phone calls and making one-to-one video conferencing calls for personal purposes. Skype is equally great as Zoom; the only thing is that it isn’t designed for working professionals.
So what differentiates Skype and Zoom, and what makes zoom the first choice for online tutoring? Let’s explore each aspect.
Pricing And Different Plans
Zoom is a free app, and so is Skype. Zoom features different paid tiers allowing users to increase storage and choose the number of whiteboards and the total number of participants. For most independent teachers, the free version of Zoom is enough for online classes.
Skype has a “Meet Now” service that is ideal for small teams but not for a teacher-student setup. The free version of Zoom is superior for practical applications when compared to Skype. It doesn’t mean that Skype is bad; it’s just that it lacks some of the best tutor-compatible features that aren’t there on Skype.
Security
Skype has end-to-end encryption, and all users appreciate its system security. Zoom also includes AES-256 and TLS encryption for live sessions. However, Zoom’s security has been questioned as it witnessed Zoombombing, where an invited participant recently joined a meeting that made headlines.
From then on, Zoom has provided additional layers of security for users.
Scalability
Skype’s basic plan for businesses supports only 250 participants, and even with premium price plans, the number of participants can’t be increased.
At the same time, Zoom supports a large team of 100 members even with the free plan. With a business plan, teachers can add up to 500 students, and with the enterprise plan, the participant number can go up to 1000.
Ease Of Use
Both Skype and Zoom are easy to use, whereas Zoom allows users to join sessions through a link. Whereas Skype mandates users to sign up and create an account and log in every time to stream sessions.
Online Tutoring-Friendly Features Of Zoom
As it is already said, Zoom was designed for online teaching and to accommodate tutors and students. This makes it obvious why Zoom is the first preference of educators as the free plan itself comes with useful and engaging benefits for teachers and students.
Support Recording Classes
Zoom comes with the feature of recording classes that Skype didn’t have earlier. Zoom allows teachers to record the calls and save them on the cloud or to the device they use to download whenever needed.
Skype recently added a feature to record the sessions where the recording will be saved in the cloud for 30 days. The recording would be erased as your teachers have to download the clip locally to store it permanently manually.
Depending on your teaching style and your requirements, Zoom might be better. Zoom comes with 5 GB storage, and you can upgrade it if you want for a fee.
Breakout Rooms Are One Of The Best Addition
If you ask me what the top feature of Zoom is, I would say it is the Breakout room. A breakout room is nothing but a feature in which you can group the members participating in a class into different groups as you want. Participants can be grouped into independent sessions either manually or automatically.
This helps teachers have full control over the switching of sessions, check on students and decide the time limit for breakout rooms. Skype doesn’t have this feature as it was not designed primarily for video classes or online tutoring.
Username And Passwords Aren’t Mandatory
Zoom supports using the online classroom without any username and password. Students can log in using the secure link provided by tutors.
This feature allows both students and teachers to attend classes easily. This feature is helpful when teaching your students under the age of 13 years. Skype also has a similar feature.
Supports Recurring Meetings
A recurring meeting allows you to set specific shareable links to online classes that don’t expire. With this feature, you can conduct the same classes every week or month. Students don’t need a username or password to access the class; they can enter the class with a link.
Whiteboard And Collaboration Features
Zoom comes with whiteboard features where teachers can express the concept in different visual ways. Whiteboard comes with sticky notes, smart connectors, annotations, drawing tools, and comments to communicate with your students in real time.
If you use tutoring software, you can integrate the Zoom whiteboard to power our tutoring website, which is a great approach for online tutors who want to build their own tutoring platform. Pinlearn is one such best online tutoring software that comes with Zoom integration to power your online classes efficiently.
Conclusion
Both Skype and Zoom are great video conferencing solutions that have many common features. However, some key differences like recurring meetings, breakout rooms, interactive features, upgrading storage, whiteboard, etc., make zoom a better choice for online tutors over skype.
While Skype isn’t designed for online teaching, it is a good option if you want to have an alternative video conferencing platform.
