Google, Microsoft, and Cisco are making their full conferencing tools free because of the coronavirus

With the rise of quarantines and travel restrictions, several companies are offering their video conferencing tools for free for a few months. This could come in handy for schools looking at alternatives to Blizzard bags, which used in locations with a lot of snow for days schools are closed. I don’t know what you use in warmer climates.

Google is offering the advanced features of Hangouts Meet for free to G Suite and G Suite for education costumers. The most important feature is the ability to record the meeting and save it to Google Drive. This allows those students that don’t have internet access the ability to watch the video later.

Microsoft is offering the advanced features of Teams, which also includes the ability to record meetings.

Cisco is also offering Webex for free.

Now is the time to play around with these offerings, to see what would work the best for you. Even though you won’t be able to use them for free forever, you might as well get some use out of them now.