VOIP for Hospitality Australia: Hotels, Restaurants, and Cafes (2026)

This guide covers VOIP phone systems for Australian hospitality businesses: cafes, takeaway shops, restaurants, motels, and hotels. Most hospitality owners who ask "what phone do we need?" are really asking a different question: "how do we stop missing bookings?" This guide answers that question directly, with a breakdown of what each type of hospitality business actually needs, what it costs in AUD, and which features matter versus which are enterprise overkill for most venues. By the end, you will know what to set up, what to avoid, and what questions to ask a provider before signing anything.

Why Hospitality Phone Needs Are Different

For most small businesses, a phone system is purely about handling calls in and out. Hospitality is different. A restaurant needs a clean reservation line that does not go to the owner's personal mobile. A small motel needs internal extensions so the front desk can reach housekeeping without walking down three corridors. A cafe needs an after-hours message that tells callers your trading hours before they show up on a public holiday you do not observe. These are not luxury features. They are the baseline that separates a professionally run venue from one that feels ad hoc.

The hospitality sector also has one feature that virtually every other small business avoids: internal communication. Hotels and motels need room-to-room calling, housekeeping coordination, and wake-up call scheduling. Restaurants need kitchen-to-front-of-house communication, especially during service. None of this appears in a standard small business phone system guide -- and most hospitality owners do not realise it is achievable at a very low cost until they look into it.

The problem is that hospitality spans an enormous range. A single-location espresso bar with two staff is completely different from a 40-room regional motel with a restaurant attached. The right phone setup for one is almost comically wrong for the other. This guide breaks it down by venue type so you can skip straight to what applies to you.

The Missed Booking Problem

Hospitality businesses lose more from phone problems than almost any other sector -- and the loss is mostly invisible. A restaurant that does not have a proper after-hours message is not tracking how many people called at 9:30pm on a Thursday, heard nothing, and booked the place across the road instead. That is not a customer complaint. It does not show up in any report. The booking simply never happened.

This is the most common missed opportunity in Australian hospitality. A caller who reaches a professional after-hours message -- "Thanks for calling The Anchor. We're open Tuesday to Sunday from noon. To make a reservation, leave your name and number and we'll call you back in the morning" -- will often wait. A caller who gets a ringing phone that nobody answers, or worse, a mobile voicemail with the owner's first name, will not.

A cloud VOIP system with basic time-of-day routing fixes this problem for around $20 to $30 a month for a single-location venue. The cost of not fixing it is not zero. Every missed after-hours booking that goes to a competitor is a direct revenue loss. For a restaurant with an average spend of $80 per head and a table of four, one missed booking per week is over $15,000 in lost revenue per year.

Feature Checklist by Venue Type

The right phone system depends entirely on what type of hospitality business you run. Here is a practical breakdown by venue type, from the simplest setup to the most complex.

Cafe and Takeaway Shop

A cafe or takeaway shop with one or two locations has a focused set of requirements. The phone is primarily a reservation or order line -- it should not be the owner's personal mobile, and it should handle calls professionally when nobody can answer.

The minimum useful setup for a cafe or takeaway includes:

• A dedicated business number -- a local geographic number that is not connected to any personal mobile. This is the most important first step. When customers save your number, it should appear as a business, not a first name.
• After-hours voicemail with trading hours -- a professional recorded message that tells callers when you are open, especially over public holidays. This takes about 10 minutes to configure and eliminates an enormous amount of wasted time for both callers and staff.
• Call recording for order disputes (optional) -- for takeaway shops handling phone orders, call recording allows you to verify what was ordered if there is a dispute. Most cloud VOIP providers include this as an optional feature. It requires a notification to the caller that the call may be recorded, which is standard practice in Australia under the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979.

A single-location cafe does not need an IVR menu, a 1300 number, or multiple extensions. The aim is to replace the mobile number with a proper business line that handles after-hours correctly. That is it. Cost: a basic cloud VOIP line runs $20 to $30 per month including a geographic number and voicemail.

Restaurant (Single Location)

A restaurant has more complex phone needs than a cafe, primarily because reservations represent a meaningful revenue commitment. A customer who cannot get through to book does not just fail to make a reservation -- they often tell others. The social cost of a poorly managed phone line is higher in restaurants than in most other hospitality businesses.

A single-location restaurant should look at:

• A dedicated reservation line -- separate from any internal or owner numbers. This number should appear on your website, Google listing, and all marketing materials.
• Click-to-call from your website -- cloud VOIP geographic numbers work natively with click-to-call on mobile websites. Customers searching on their phone can tap your number directly without copying it. This is free and takes no configuration.
• Professional voicemail with callback instructions -- not a generic "you've reached [voicemail]" but a recorded message that gives your trading hours and asks callers to leave their name, number, and preferred booking time. A VOIP provider can configure this from your recording or generate a text-to-speech version.
• After-hours routing -- time-of-day call routing so that calls outside trading hours go to voicemail automatically, without any staff action. You set it once and forget it.
• 1300 number (only for multi-location) -- a 1300 number makes sense for a restaurant group with multiple locations in different cities, where a single national number routes callers to the nearest venue. For a single-location restaurant, a local geographic number is the right choice. It signals that you are a local, established business -- which is a genuine advantage for restaurants competing for local patronage.

A 2-3 seat cloud VOIP setup for a restaurant (one or two staff lines, hosted PBX, after-hours routing) typically runs $50 to $100 per month. See our VOIP cost guide for a breakdown by seat count.

Small Motel and Accommodation (Under 20 Rooms)

A small motel or bed-and-breakfast has needs that go beyond a restaurant in one key dimension: internal communications. Guests need to reach the front desk, the front desk needs to reach housekeeping, and housekeeping needs to report room status without walking back to the office.

For a small accommodation property, look for:

• Reception line with professional greeting -- a main inbound number that answers with your property name, not a personal mobile.
• Internal extensions for room phones -- cloud VOIP systems support this via SIP extensions. Each room phone becomes an extension on your hosted PBX. Guests can dial the front desk (e.g., extension 0), room to room, or call externally. This does not require expensive proprietary room phone hardware -- basic SIP desk phones in rooms cost $40 to $80 AUD each.
• Wake-up call scheduling -- most cloud VOIP systems support scheduled outbound calls via the auto-attendant. The front desk schedules a wake-up call, the system dials the room extension at the set time and plays a message. No proprietary PBX hardware required.
• DECT cordless for housekeeping -- housekeeping staff moving between rooms benefit from DECT cordless handsets rather than fixed desk phones. A DECT handset connects wirelessly to your hosted PBX system and behaves identically to a desk phone. See our DECT cordless phone guide for recommendations.
• After-hours routing -- calls outside staffed hours should route to an on-call mobile or a voicemail with instructions for self-check-in or emergency contact.

A 3-5 seat setup for a small motel (reception, a couple of room phones, DECT for housekeeping) typically runs $75 to $150 per month from an Australian cloud VOIP provider. This replaces what would previously have cost several thousand dollars in proprietary PBX hardware.

Hotel (10 or More Rooms)

A hotel with 10 or more rooms needs a more complete phone system, but the core principles still apply: do not over-engineer it unless the operational complexity genuinely demands it.

For a hotel-scale property, the additional requirements beyond the small motel list include:

• Full PBX functionality -- ring groups, call queues, IVR menus (e.g., "press 1 for room service, press 2 for reception"), extension-to-extension calling throughout the property.
• Room billing integration -- if you are using hotel management software (PMS) such as RMS Cloud, Protel, or similar, your phone system ideally integrates with it to log room-to-external calls and add charges to the guest folio. Not all cloud VOIP providers support PMS integration -- this is one of the first questions to ask. If your provider does not support it, you may need to handle room call billing separately or use a hybrid system.
• DECT cordless for housekeeping and maintenance -- larger properties benefit from a DECT multi-cell system (multiple base stations) to maintain coverage across floors and buildings. Brands like Gigaset and Yealink offer multi-cell DECT systems that are compatible with cloud VOIP.
• PoE switches for room phones -- modern SIP desk phones are powered over Ethernet (PoE). If your property has older internal cabling without PoE-capable switches, you will need to upgrade switches or use PoE injectors before deploying IP phones to rooms. This is a common infrastructure cost that surprises operators who do not discover it until handsets arrive on site.

For a hotel with 10-30 rooms, expect a full cloud VOIP setup to cost $200 to $500 per month depending on seat count, features, and whether PMS integration is required. This is still considerably less than a traditional on-premise PBX system, which can cost $10,000 to $50,000 upfront in hardware plus ongoing maintenance contracts.

The Old Way vs Cloud VOIP: Hotels and the Legacy PBX

For most of the last 30 years, hotels ran on proprietary on-premise PBX hardware -- systems from manufacturers like Nortel, NEC, or Mitel. These systems were purpose-built for hospitality, with room phone management, housekeeping status integration, wake-up call modules, and guest billing built directly into the hardware. They worked, but they came with significant costs.

A Nortel or NEC hotel PBX installation for a 30-room property could easily cost $30,000 to $80,000 in hardware, plus ongoing maintenance contracts and a local technician who knew the system. When the system failed -- and they did fail, often catastrophically at the worst possible times -- the cost to repair or replace it was significant. When the hotel wanted to add a feature, it usually meant a hardware upgrade and another technician visit.

Cloud VOIP changed this model completely. The PBX now lives in a data centre, not in a server room behind reception. Hardware on site is reduced to a decent internet connection, a PoE switch, and the phones themselves. Feature updates happen without technician visits. Capacity scales up or down with a few clicks. The monthly cost is predictable and cancellable. The catch -- and it is a real one -- is that your phone system is now entirely dependent on your internet connection. If the internet goes down, so do the phones.

For a hotel, this means internet reliability is no longer just a guest amenity question. It is a core operational requirement. A second internet connection (via a different provider and ideally a different technology -- mobile 4G/5G backup is common) should be part of any hotel phone system project.

NBN and Connectivity in Hospitality Venues

Many older hospitality venues have poor internal cabling. A building that was wired for analogue telephony in the 1990s was not designed for PoE-powered IP phones on every floor. Before committing to a cloud VOIP deployment in an older property, a basic infrastructure audit is worthwhile.

Key considerations:

• Internet connection quality -- VOIP calls require consistent upload speed and low jitter. NBN Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) and Fibre to the Building (FTTB) connections are generally reliable for VOIP. NBN Fibre to the Node (FTTN) can introduce issues, particularly in older buildings with long copper runs from the node to the premises. Use our VOIP bandwidth calculator to check whether your current connection can support your expected call volume.
• PoE switches -- IP desk phones require PoE switches or PoE injectors to function without a separate power cable at every desk and room. Most modern switches include PoE, but older infrastructure may need to be upgraded. Budget around $80 to $250 per 8-16 port PoE switch depending on grade.
• DECT coverage -- in multi-storey or multi-building properties, a single DECT base station will not cover the entire property. Multi-cell DECT systems use multiple base stations to maintain seamless coverage. Plan the base station placement based on the property floor plan before ordering hardware.
• The modem's green port is not a real VOIP service -- many hospitality venues are currently using the ATA port on their NBN modem as their "phone line." This is an ISP-controlled analog adapter -- the VOIP configuration is locked into the modem firmware and the credentials are owned by the ISP, not the business. It supports one call at a time, cannot be integrated with any PBX system, and will fail completely if the ISP changes the service. If this describes your current setup, moving to a proper cloud VOIP service is the first step, not the last.

Staff Turnover and Simplicity: A Hard Requirement in Hospitality

Hospitality has the highest staff turnover of almost any industry in Australia. A casual who starts on the weekend will be answering the phone by their second shift. The person who set up your IVR menu nine months ago may have left three weeks later. The configuration notes they promised to write down were never written down.

This makes simplicity a hard requirement in hospitality phone systems -- not a preference. A complicated IVR menu with five levels of options and conditional routing that only the previous manager understood is not a feature. It is a liability. When the casual staff member cannot figure out how to transfer a call, the guest experience suffers. When the manager who set up the auto-attendant leaves, nobody can change the trading hours message when Christmas comes around.

The rule of thumb for hospitality is this: if a casual staff member cannot use the system confidently within five minutes of being shown it, the system is too complicated for your venue. This does not mean your phone system needs to be limited -- it means the features you use should be the ones that can be operated without training, and the ones that require setup should be simple enough that any manager can update them through a web portal.

A good cloud VOIP provider offers a web-based admin portal where you can update your after-hours message, change call routing rules, and add or remove extensions without calling support or waiting for a technician. When the time comes to update your Christmas trading hours message at 10pm on Christmas Eve, the manager on duty should be able to do that themselves from their phone.

Geographic Numbers vs 1300 Numbers vs Mobile

For most restaurants and cafes, the right choice is a local geographic number -- a number with a local area code that matches your city or region. This is what customers expect when they search for a local restaurant on Google. It signals that you are an established, locally owned business. It costs nothing extra with a standard VOIP plan.

A mobile number as your primary business line is the most common mistake in small hospitality businesses. It looks informal. When a customer calls "0412 XXX XXX" to make a reservation, there is no business greeting, no hold music, and no after-hours message -- just a personal mobile voicemail if nobody answers. It also means that when the owner changes phones, loses the phone, or changes carriers, the business number is disrupted.

A 1300 number makes sense in specific hospitality contexts: a restaurant group with locations in multiple cities where a single national number routes to the correct venue, or a hotel chain where guests and travel agents need a consistent national contact number. For a single-location business, a 1300 number adds cost and complexity without a clear benefit. See our 1300 numbers guide and our 1300 vs 1800 comparison for full details on when a 1300 number is worth it.

For a multi-location group, our multi-site phone system guide covers the routing and management architecture in detail.

What a Basic Hospitality Phone Setup Looks Like

To make this concrete, here is what a basic VOIP setup looks like for two common hospitality scenarios.

Scenario 1: A Single-Location Cafe

A cafe with 8 staff and one location needs the simplest version of a proper business phone system. The setup:

• One cloud VOIP line with a local geographic number (e.g., 07 XXXX XXXX for Brisbane)
• One SIP desk phone at the counter ($80 to $150 AUD for a basic Yealink or Grandstream handset)
• After-hours voicemail with a recorded message including trading hours
• Online portal access so the owner or manager can update messages themselves

Monthly cost: approximately $20 to $30 AUD per month for the hosted line. One-off hardware cost: $80 to $150 for the handset. Total first-year cost: under $600. The owner's personal mobile number is no longer the business number. Calls after hours go to a professional voicemail. Done.

Scenario 2: A 15-Room Motel with a Restaurant

A 15-room motel with an attached restaurant needs a hosted PBX with multiple extensions. The setup:

• Hosted VOIP PBX with 5 external lines (reception, restaurant reservation line, internal only)
• Desk phones at reception and the restaurant host stand
• SIP room phones in each guest room (basic models, $40 to $80 each)
• 2 DECT cordless handsets for housekeeping staff
• Time-based routing: reception hours vs after-hours on-call mobile
• Wake-up call scheduling via auto-attendant
• Online admin portal for the manager to update routing and messages

Monthly cost: approximately $100 to $180 AUD per month for a 5-seat hosted VOIP plan. One-off hardware: $1,500 to $3,000 for handsets and PoE switch. This replaces a system that would have cost $15,000 to $40,000 in legacy PBX hardware plus maintenance contracts.

For help sizing your specific setup, try our Phone System Sizing Wizard or get a personalised recommendation via our recommendation service.

Australian Hospitality Businesses: What You Need to Know

There are several Australia-specific factors that affect hospitality phone system decisions that generic guides do not cover.

PSTN copper shutdown. Australia's PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) copper landline infrastructure has been switched off as part of the NBN rollout. Any business still using a traditional copper landline is either already on NBN or will be shortly. If your current phone service uses a line that has not been migrated to NBN, contact your provider. Do not wait for a disruption to force the change.

Number porting. If you are switching from a current landline or ISP-provided phone service to a proper cloud VOIP provider, you can port (transfer) your existing number. This takes 5 to 10 business days for standard geographic numbers in Australia, and the process is governed by the ACMA's number portability rules. During the porting window, both services should remain active -- a good provider will manage this transition so you do not lose calls. See our number porting guide for full detail on the process and what can go wrong.

000 emergency calling on VOIP. Unlike a traditional landline, VOIP phones may not automatically route 000 calls if your internet connection fails. Most reputable Australian VOIP providers register your address for emergency call routing, but this is worth confirming with your provider before completing setup. Staff in any venue should know the alternative number for emergency services (112 from a mobile) as a backup.

Call recording regulations. In Australia, recording a phone call requires that at least one party to the call consents. For business call recording, the standard practice is a recorded message at the start of the call -- "this call may be recorded for quality purposes." This satisfies the consent requirement under state listening devices laws. Check with your VOIP provider's documentation to confirm how call recording notifications are handled in your plan.

Power outages. Cloud VOIP phones require both internet and power to function. During a power outage, NBN and VOIP services will fail unless you have battery backup (UPS) for your modem, router, and PoE switch. For a hospitality business that operates during extended hours, a small UPS for network equipment is a sensible investment -- particularly in areas prone to brief outages. Alternatively, configure your after-hours routing to divert to a mobile number as an automatic fallback.

Common Mistakes Hospitality Businesses Make with Phone Systems

These are the mistakes that come up repeatedly when hospitality businesses look at their phone setup honestly.

Mistake 1: Using the Owner's Mobile as the Business Number

This is the single most common problem in small hospitality businesses. The business number is the owner's personal mobile. When the owner is in service, they cannot answer. When they are on leave, the business number rings to a person who is not there. When they eventually leave the business, the number goes with them.

A dedicated business number via cloud VOIP fixes this completely. The number is owned by the business, not the individual. It can be answered by any staff member on any device. It has a professional greeting, after-hours routing, and voicemail. It costs the same as one coffee per day.

Mistake 2: The ISP ATA Trap

Many hospitality venues are using the green phone port on the back of their NBN modem as their business phone line. This is an ISP-controlled analog telephone adapter -- the connection is programmed into the modem firmware and owned by the ISP. The business cannot take those credentials to a different provider. The line cannot be integrated with any PBX system. It supports one call at a time. It has no web portal, no after-hours routing, and no voicemail configuration beyond what the ISP provides.

This setup is especially common in older venues that were migrated to NBN without anyone explaining the options. The venue thinks they have VOIP because the ISP said so. What they actually have is a legacy analog line carried over NBN, with all the limitations of a 1990s single line and none of the features of a modern phone system.

The fix is to sign up with an independent cloud VOIP provider, get a proper hosted SIP service, and connect a real VOIP handset via Ethernet. The modem's green port can be left unused or disconnected.

Mistake 3: Over-Engineering the Phone System for the Venue Size

A 40-seat restaurant does not need the phone system of a 200-room Marriott. Some hospitality operators get talked into enterprise-grade systems by vendors who benefit from larger installations. Multi-level IVR menus, CRM integrations, call analytics dashboards, and unified comms platforms are genuinely useful at scale. They are actively harmful in a small venue where the casual staff member answering the phone has no idea how any of it works.

Start with the minimum viable setup that solves your actual problem. For most cafes and restaurants, that is a dedicated line, after-hours routing, and a professional voicemail. You can always add features when you genuinely need them -- cloud VOIP scales up far more easily than it scales down from an over-complicated initial configuration.

Mistake 4: No After-Hours Message

The single easiest improvement any hospitality business can make. If your phone does not have a professional after-hours message with your trading hours and a callback or booking instruction, you are actively sending potential customers to competitors every evening. This takes less than 30 minutes to configure once you have a cloud VOIP service, and it works automatically from that day forward without any staff involvement. See our after-hours call routing guide for setup instructions.

Your Next Steps

Here is the practical checklist for a hospitality business that wants to sort out its phone system properly.

• Identify what you actually have now. Is your current business number a mobile, an ISP ATA port, a legacy landline, or a proper VOIP service? This determines whether you need to port a number or start fresh.
• Decide on your number. For most single-location venues, a local geographic number is the right choice. For a group with multiple locations, consider a 1300 number. Do not keep using a personal mobile as the primary business number.
• Choose a cloud VOIP provider that serves hospitality. Look for a provider that offers: a hosted PBX plan with extensions, time-of-day routing, voicemail, DECT handset support, and an easy-to-use web admin portal. Australian providers with local support are preferable to offshore-only providers -- when something goes wrong during service, you want to be able to speak to someone.
• Plan your hardware based on your venue type. Use the setup examples in this guide as a starting point. Do not buy hardware before confirming it is compatible with your chosen provider.
• Check your internet connection. Run a connection test and confirm your NBN connection can support the number of simultaneous calls you need. A basic VOIP call uses around 80-100 kbps of upload bandwidth per call -- most NBN connections handle this easily, but older FTTN connections with marginal upload speeds should be tested first.
• Set up your after-hours message on day one. Do not leave this for later. This is the highest-return, lowest-effort change you can make.
• Train casual staff in 5 minutes. If your staff cannot learn the basics in a single walkthrough, simplify the configuration. The phone system should serve the team, not the other way around.

If you want a recommendation based on your specific venue type and requirements, use our free recommendation service -- it takes about 2 minutes to submit and we will match you with the right solution for your setup.

For a full comparison of the cloud phone systems available to Australian businesses -- covering features, pricing, and what to look for -- see Best VOIP Phone System for Small Business Australia.

If you are still on a traditional ISP phone line and wondering whether cloud VOIP is worth switching to, see VOIP vs Traditional Phone Australia for a plain-English comparison.

Do I need a different phone system for a cafe versus a restaurant?

The difference is mostly about call volume and complexity. A cafe with mostly walk-in trade may only need a single line with after-hours voicemail. A restaurant that takes reservations needs a more reliable reservation line, professional greetings, and after-hours routing that actively captures booking requests. Both are served by the same cloud VOIP technology -- the difference is in the configuration, not the platform. A good provider will set both up from the same hosted PBX plan at a similar price point.

Can I keep my existing phone number if I switch to VOIP?

Yes, in almost all cases. Porting an existing geographic number to a new cloud VOIP provider is a standard process governed by ACMA rules. It typically takes 5 to 10 business days. During the porting process, your existing service should remain active so you do not lose calls. A reputable VOIP provider will manage the port for you and confirm when the number has transferred. If your current number is assigned to an ISP ATA port and bundled into your NBN plan, porting it out may affect your ISP plan -- check this with your provider before initiating the port.

Do cloud VOIP systems support room phones in hotels and motels?

Yes. Modern cloud VOIP systems support SIP extensions, which means any SIP-compatible desk phone can become a room phone on your hosted PBX. Guests can dial the front desk extension directly, rooms can call each other, and the front desk can transfer calls to individual rooms. Wake-up call scheduling is also supported by most hosted PBX platforms via the auto-attendant scheduler -- the system dials the room extension at the set time and plays a pre-recorded message. Basic SIP desk phones suitable for hotel rooms cost $40 to $80 AUD each from Australian distributors.

What happens to the phones during a power outage?

Cloud VOIP phones require both internet access and power to function. During a power outage, your modem, router, and PoE switch will all lose power unless you have a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) providing battery backup. Without backup power, your phone system goes offline. For hospitality businesses operating through the evening -- when outages are most likely to matter -- a small UPS for network equipment is a sensible investment. Alternatively, configure your VOIP system to automatically divert calls to a mobile number when the main system is unreachable.

Is a 1300 number worth it for a restaurant?

For a single-location restaurant, no. A 1300 number provides a single national number that can route to different locations, but for one venue it adds monthly cost ($20 to $30 AUD per month from ACMA-registered providers) with no meaningful benefit to local customers. A local geographic number with your area code is the right choice for a single-location restaurant -- it looks local, it feels established, and it costs less. A 1300 number becomes worth considering for a restaurant group with locations in multiple cities, where a single national booking number makes operational sense. See our 1300 number guide for full details on costs and use cases.

How does call recording work for takeaway order disputes?

Call recording in Australian businesses requires that callers be informed the call may be recorded. This is usually handled by a brief recorded message at the start of the call -- something like "this call may be recorded for quality and training purposes." This satisfies the consent requirements under state listening devices legislation. Most cloud VOIP providers include call recording as an optional feature on standard plans. Recordings are typically stored in your provider's cloud portal, accessible by the account administrator for a set retention period (usually 30 to 90 days). For a takeaway shop using call recording for order dispute resolution, ensure you understand your provider's retention policy and data storage practices before enabling the feature.

Can VOIP work with hotel management software like RMS Cloud?

Some cloud VOIP providers support PMS (Property Management System) integration, which allows room-to-external calls to be logged and billed to guest folios automatically. This is not a universal feature -- it depends on the provider and the PMS platform. If PMS integration is important to your operation, ask specifically about it before committing to a provider. Request the list of supported PMS systems and confirm whether your version is included. If your chosen provider does not support PMS integration, room call billing will need to be handled separately or manually. For most small motels and accommodation properties, PMS integration is a nice-to-have rather than a must-have -- it matters most for larger properties with significant room-to-external call volumes.

What is the minimum internet speed needed for VOIP in a hospitality venue?

A single VOIP call uses approximately 80 to 100 kbps of upload and download bandwidth. For a cafe or restaurant with 2 to 3 simultaneous calls at peak, a standard NBN plan with 20 Mbps upload is more than sufficient. For a hotel handling 10 or more simultaneous calls, you need a more reliable connection -- NBN FTTP or FTTB is preferable to FTTN for call quality. The more important factor is consistency, not raw speed: a 50 Mbps connection with variable jitter will deliver worse call quality than a 20 Mbps connection with stable, low-jitter performance. Use our VOIP bandwidth calculator to check your specific connection against your expected call volume.