Efax Plus Review: High Price Still a Hurdle for Solid Fax Service

Our Verdict

Unless y'all demand to create an international fax number, you'll discover improve, more than cost-effective solutions than Efax, including MetroFax and SRFax.

For

• Clean Web portal design
• Useful mobile app
• Secure faxing with large file support

Against

• Expensive
• Outdated desktop app
• Can't update cover page

Tom's Guide Verdict

Unless you need to create an international fax number, you'll notice improve, more cost-effective solutions than Efax, including MetroFax and SRFax.

Pros

• +

  Clean Web portal design

• +

  Useful mobile app

• +

  Secure faxing with big file support

Cons

• -

  Expensive

• -

  Outdated desktop app

• -

  Can't update cover folio

Editors' Note: Equally function of our periodic re-testing of fax services, we've updated this review to reflect changes made at Efax, including changes to pricing.

Efax is the granddaddy of fax services, and arguably the flagship service of the plethora of J2 Global-powered fax services. (J2 also owns MetroFax and Sfax, which we both charge per unit higher than Efax.) The Efax Plus service adds some features to a higher place and beyond rival faxing services, including file-sharing and a custom e-mail address. But for what Efax Plus gains with these enhancements, it loses for unattractive pricing.

Every bit solid equally Efax Plus is, you've got more affordable choices amongst the best online fax services.

• Fax.Plus review: A peachy low-cost alternative to Efax
• Become the best cable modem for your home function

Efax Plus review: Pricing

The Efax Plus monthly accuse is $xvi.95. That includes 150 complimentary pages each for incoming and outgoing faxes. Each additional page is ten cents apiece. International rates vary; choose the fax destination and currency from a drop-down, and Efax shows you the send rates. Some random examples of the dramatic range I plant: 10 cents a folio for Switzerland versus $1.06 a page for Panama.

Efax Pro costs $iii more each calendar month, and that $nineteen.95 fee ups your limit to 200 pages of incoming and approachable faxes. In that location'south a $x activation fee for both plans — something competing services don't accuse. Occasionally, eFax will drib that fee from one or both of its plans.

As well that activation fee, Efax's monthly rates are likewise higher than most of its competitors, especially considering the comparatively low incoming and outgoing page allowances. At the time of this writing, Efax was offering two months free with an annual plan for either the Plus or Pro services. Even with that promotion, Efax remains more than expensive than competitors.

Free Trial: Like its competitors, Efax offers a free trial, one time you sign up for an account. It used to be thirty days, only now you get fourteen days to exam out the service.

Efax Plus review: Setup

To sign up, you'll option your country; cull to search for a number by area code, state, Nothing code, or toll free; so enter the parameter you chose to receive a fax number. I selected San Francisco's 415 area code, then picked a number from the options presented.

You can choose a local, cost-free, or international fax number. In fact, Efax is the just service nosotros tested to let you pick an international number. Efax generates a four-digit numeric password for you lot.

Yous'll enter your name and email accost, followed by address and billing info, and that'due south it — you're set to fax.

Efax Plus review: File support

Efax lists back up for 37 files types, including all the usual suspects and a few we wouldn't expect, such as Quattro Pro or Amiga Interchange File Format. My guess is, those are holdovers from when Efax launched back in 1993.

Efax Plus review: Interface

Efax'due south spider web interface supports sending upwards to 10 documents, or up to 18MB total, and the look is fairly simple and pleasing. In fact, information technology'south identical to that of MetroFax — not surprising given that they have the same owner in J2 Global. Like MetroFax, Efax lets you lot tag and search faxes, and it supports up to five e-mail address for utilise with a given fax account.

Efax has the same stye of "Websend" pop-upward for sending faxes via the Web portal found in MetroFax. Hither, you can select multiple files to send, add addressees, and then send your fax. You lot're likewise able to transport a fax via email past using the "to" field every bit your destination fax number, followed past "@efaxsend.com."

The biggest departure between Efax and MetroFax is that Efax sports a large link at bottom for sending large files via another J2-owned service, FuseMail. FuseMail is now fully integrated into the Efax service, though.

If you select FuseMail, a send pop-upwards appears inside the Efax home page, similar to the "Websend" popular-upwardly for sending faxes. Enter your proper noun, the destination electronic mail, subject and message text; and so, just attach upward to 3GB of files. You tin can even get a notification when the file is downloaded. Hit ship, and your file(southward) are off to the recipient, attainable via a FuseMail certificate link automatically expiring xc-days later.

Efax has another feature that sets it autonomously: It has an option, buried in its settings, to send faxes using a secure SSL encrypted container. If you select this pick, you lot'll get a link to an SSL browser window, enter the account and countersign, and y'all can so view the fax. To enable this feature, you have to contact Efax first.

Efax Plus review: Mobile apps

Also like MetroFax, Efax has a mobile app for iOS and Android. In fact, when I looked at the Android version, I found information technology to exist identical to MetroFax's offering.

The latest Efax app lets you upload files from your device, email, or cloud storage services including Google Drive, Box, and Dropbox. You can add tags to faxes to facilitate searching, and the app lets you file faxes in custom folders or add a signature by annotating a fax while reading it. You can add a signature using your finger, save that signature locally, and resize it to append to a fax — a convoluted process, but a functional 1.

We did experience a weird glitch, where the app didn't work on one of our mobile devices. When it did work on, though, it delivered one of the best mobile faxing experiences we've seen — exterior of its faxing twin, MetroFax.

Efax also still offers a relic from its past, the crude-looking desktop app Efax Messenger. A remnant from the Windows 98 era, this app allows you to annotate and sign faxes. Unfortunately, the signature capability remains rough — even more than so than on the mobile app south— and like the mobile apps, it's not the legally binding signature capability of competing services similar HelloFax'southward HelloSign. Rather, you "sign" a document by manually cropping a signature out of a browse, storing information technology with your profile, and so adding information technology to the fax.

Efax Plus review: Verdict

Efax has good functionality in its web browser-based interface, but the service is overpriced for what yous go. MetroFax costs half the price, and delivers much of the same experience in an identical mode.

Melissa Perenson spent more than than a decade at PC Globe and TechHive, and she has freelanced for numerous publications including Computer Shopper, Tom'southward Guide, TechRadar and Consumers Digest.

Source: https://www.tomsguide.com/us/efax-plus-fax-service,review-5084.html

Posted by: jamesyousterromme.blogspot.com

Share this post