Best Virtual Event Software Platforms of 2023
In order to host your event you’ll need a capable virtual event software. DIY organizers and any virtual event planner researching the best virtual event software platform will discover the pros, cons and the “I wish I knew that” of the top software platforms.
Our virtual event planners and producers have experience with these platforms, so if you have a particular platform of interest, our production team can integrate and use it to manage your virtual event.
The 5 Best Virtual Event Platforms
Virtual event software allows you to organize, bring your event online, and create the engagement of an in-person event to computers and mobile devices across the world. To shortcut your research and simplify things, the Webcasting and Virtual Events team reviewed the 5 best virtual event software platforms on the market, and can use any of these to run your virtual event:
1) On24 Virtual Event Platform
ON24 is a dynamic webinar platform helping small, medium, and large enterprises create digital experiences for their audiences. ON24 offers its users extensive initial and ongoing training, which it is highly appealing for the DIY producer. Some of the features that the ON24 platform includes are:
- Branding on everything used in a webinar
- Easy-to-use tools for producers and presenters
- Easy design with “drag & drop” tools
- Interactive audience experience
- Engaging and interactive virtual experiences
- No Downloads offering maximum reach
- Real-time reporting, statistics, and analytics
- Lead generation tools
- Online registration
- Real-time chat
- Instant messaging
- Video conferencing
- Call monitoring, recording, routing, and transfer
- Survey/poll management
- Highly customizable screens to develop webinars that fully represent your brand
- Software that tracks and generates reports on everything attendees engage, click on, and visit
- Collected data is categorized to generate in-depth reporting, statistics, and analytics
- Allows your audience to interact with speakers and move through events within the overall virtual event
- Simulive – a proprietary feature – all but eliminates audio and visual glitches while weaving pre-recorded content with live Q&A sessions and real-time chat
- 2,500 maximum attendee capacity.
Opportunities to Improve
While ON24 remains a leader of virtual event technology, there are a few areas where the software finds itself at a disadvantage, consider the following:
- Older devices frequently experience problems handling video output
- Needs better/more compatibility with video archiving services (Vimeo, Youtube)
- Some users have reported a delay between the live speaker and audience
- Some users have experienced difficulties when editing past webinars
Pricing
ON24 does not publish its service price range, but here’s what they do publish:
- Free Trial – 30 day
Founded in 1998 as Newsource. In 1999, ON24 changed its name and shifted its focus to becoming an online financial news streaming media source. Since then, ON24 has developed its platform to provide a data-rich, audio and visual webinar experience.
2) vFairs Virtual Event Platform
vFairs allows entrepreneurs, organizations, and large businesses to collaborate, exchange ideas, and exchange documents via trade shows, job fairs, career fairs, seminars, conferences, etc. This web conferencing software has many attractive features, including:
- Cloud-based deployment
- Multi-lingual support
- Secure data access facility
- Mobile Access
- Customizable branding
- Screen Sharing
- On-demand webcasting
- Presentation streaming
- Live webinars
- Record and playback ability
- Video Conferencing
- Real-time chat
- Detailed reporting, statistics, and analytics
- More than 160 informative and tutorial articles
- Multiple demo videos on Youtube
- 24/7 email tech support
- Dedicated event manager
Opportunities to Improve
While vFairs boasts ease-of-use, an ability to deliver measurable results, and numerous positive reviews, consider the following complaints from other users:
- Difficulty in sending followup or reminder emails to users that have already registered for an event
- Some reviews mention missing or dysfunctional features
- Several reviewers reported difficulties regarding user interactions and poor user experience
Pricing
- vFairs does not publish any pricing information.
vFairs was founded in 2016 and is currently with offices in the USA, Canada, and Dubai.
3) Splash Virtual Event Platform
Splash is an easy-to-use marketing software that helps small, medium, and large businesses create branded experiences for virtual, in-person, and hybrid events. This platform offers many features, including:
- No-Code website design
- Secure event ticketing
- Mobile event check-in
- Automated messaging
- Intelligent event data usage
- System integrations
The features within the softwares’ entirety provide you the ability of Splash scaling with your business’ growth and need to produce virtual events.
Among the benefits offered by Splash, Its tech support and training include:
- Frequent live tutorial webinars
- Dozens of on-demand tutorials and informational webinars
- Numerous “how-to” and tutorial videos readily available on YouTube
Splash’s most attractive feature is its no-code website design that enables its users to easily create event landing pages where attendees sign-up. Likewise, attendees are presented with a seamless invitation/signup process, scheduled reminders through the event, and followup surveys post-event.
Opportunities to Improve
Areas where Splash users communicate they can improve their platform include::
- Customer support is only accessible via email (preferably via the app’s email)
- Some users mention Splash being more self-service than it is portrayed to be
- Some users mention rare format glitches.
- Limited emailing capacity in the starter plan
Pricing
Splash does not publish its service price range, but shares:
- Free Trial and Personal Events
Splash is a privately held company founded by Ben Hindman and Brett Boskoff, providing ready-to-use virtual event marketing programs in which users can choose to embed live streaming technology or integrate with webinar and/or virtual event platforms.
4) Hopin Virtual Event Platform
Hopin is a live online events platform with the tools and capacity to replicate in-person events online. Used for webinars, conferences, trade shows, summits, workshops, forums, and other events. The platform features list includes the following:
- Flexible and modular software
- Scalable platform for all kinds of events and business sizes
- Fully branded presentation
- Branding placement for sponsors
- Stage for presentations
- Live chat feature
- Virtual vendor booths
- Sessions for group breakout discussions
- Interactive expo areas
- 1-on-1 meetings and networking features
- Virtual backstage for speakers
- Registration and ticket sales
- Ticket sales by type
- Recent registrations
- Registrations by country
- Turnout, maximum attendance, and time spent
- Current attendees and total network meetings
- Top areas by number of attendees
- Total chat messages and chat messages by area
- Top expo booths by interaction
- Top attendees by expo booth interaction
Opportunities to Improve
While Hopin touts great reviews, there are these reported issues from users of the platform:
- The main stage and other presentations may experience lag.
- Customer service response is not immediate. There is no phone number for direct contact.
- Some video integrations with the platform may cause technical issues.
Pricing
Hopin has four plans, including:
- Starter at $99/mo
- Growth at $799/mo
- Business (includes advanced features) – pricing not listed
- Enterprise (unlocks all of Hopin’s features) – pricing not listed
Founded by Johnny Boufarhat in 2019 in London, UK. Hopin’s platform began as a networking tool for matching people one-on-one. The platform rapidly grew into a full-conference “all-in-one” online events platform.
5) 6Connex Virtual Event Platform
6Connex is an event software platform that’s used to run fully branded, webinars, summits, conferences, trade shows, workshops, and other virtual events. The features that stand out in the 6Connex platform include:
- Capable of a fully custom-branded event experience
- Web-based (no extra software needed)
- Preloaded with template galleries, and the ability to create custom layouts
- Browser-based venue builder
- Closed captioning functionality
- Live chat functionality
- Live streaming
- Virtual lobby
- Customizable booths
- Information kiosks
- Reporting, statistics, and analytics
Among these benefits, in the real time live chat 6Connex provides a multi-language translation tool, which makes every event friendly to attendees across the globe. The platform is entirely cloud hosted, leveraging Amazon Web Services (AWS). As such, all services communicate and work with each other, permitting you to scale on-demand as needed.
Opportunities to Improve
While 6Connex is a powerful platform, customers have noted the following feedback:
- The majority of live chats are conducted via text
- Video and voice chat capability (when available on the platform) requires Skype integration
- The addition or inclusion of many advanced features can come with a lofty price tag
- No software required (web-based platform)
- Operating systems for PC, MAC, and mobile devices are all supported
- Customers frequently refer to 6Connex as more of a business partner than a software service
- User ease of use with simple icons/controls used to navigate the entirety of your event
Pricing
- 6Connex does not publish any pricing information.
Founded in 2009, 6Connex is a US-based event software platform owned by Dura Software and is hosted entirely in the cloud, able to scale up in real-time, to accommodate 30,000+ attendees without difficulties.
We handle planning, know the best technology, and how to engage your audience. Let’s build your virtual event!
We know the ingredients for a flawless virtual event. There are a few critical factors we look forward to sharing, and anticipate helping transition your event online without interruption or headache. Simply communicate your requirements, questions, and let us do the rest.