Is ViciDial free? The short answer
Yes, is ViciDial free has a simple answer at the software level. You can download it, install it on as many servers as you like, run as many agents as your hardware can handle and change the code, without paying anyone a license fee. The free ViciBox installer gives you a working system on a bare server.
What is not free is everything around it: the server, the carrier minutes, the phone numbers, the person who sets it up and the person who fixes it. We priced those lines out in our ViciDial pricing guide. This post is about the license itself, and the questions owners in Pakistan and India keep asking when a vendor quote arrives with a line called "ViciDial license" on it.
What the AGPL license allows you to do
ViciDial is released under the GNU Affero General Public License, usually shortened to AGPL. The project's own documentation names the exact version, and it is worth reading the license file in the copy you install rather than relying on a summary. In plain terms, the AGPL gives you four freedoms: to run the software for any purpose, to study and change the code, to share copies, and to share your changed versions.
Running it for any purpose includes commercial use. A floor in Faisalabad or Noida can run US insurance campaigns on ViciDial for profit without asking anyone. There is no seat count in the license and no clause that turns it off after a trial.
This is different from software that is free to try. A trial ends. A freemium plan caps seats or features and asks you to upgrade. ViciDial has no paid tier hidden behind the free one. Every feature in the code is available to every install, which is why a two-seat test server and a 200-seat floor can run the same build.
The one obligation most floors never touch
The AGPL is a copyleft license. Its distinctive rule is about networks: if you modify the software and let people use that modified version over a network, you are expected to offer those users the source code of your changes. That rule is why the AGPL exists. It closes the gap where a company changes open-source software, runs it as a service and keeps the changes private.
For a typical floor running stock ViciDial for its own agents, this rarely comes up. It matters more for vendors who rebrand ViciDial, modify it and sell access to it as a hosted product. If you are building that kind of business, or have paid a developer for custom changes you plan to offer to other companies, talk to a lawyer who knows open-source licenses. This is a summary, not legal advice.
There is a second practical point. Because the code is open, you can ask any competent developer to read it, fix it or extend it. You are not tied to the person who installed it. For an owner, that is the most useful freedom in the license, because it means a vendor relationship can end without the dialer ending with it.
What free does not cover
A license fee of zero says nothing about running costs. Here is what a ViciDial floor pays for even though the software is free:
- A server, either rented in a US data center, kept in your office, or provided by a hosting company per seat
- A SIP carrier for outbound and inbound minutes, usually billed in dollars
- DIDs for caller ID, plus replacements when numbers get flagged
- Installation and configuration, done by your staff or a vendor
- Ongoing support: patches, backups, carrier changes and the 2 a.m. PKT outage
- Your time learning the admin screens well enough to set call times, DNC lists and drop limits correctly
- Optional extras such as paid add-ons, custom reports or CRM work from a developer
Why someone is quoting you for a ViciDial license
Vendors in both countries sell ViciDial in packages, and some label part of the price as a license. Usually what they are charging for is real: hosting, setup, support, a customised build, or their own add-on modules. The label is the problem, not the charge. It makes it harder to compare one quote against another, and it can make an owner think they cannot move away without losing a license they paid for.
In practice, a floor that leaves such a vendor keeps the right to run ViciDial. What it may lose is the server, the custom changes and the DIDs, depending on the contract. Read that part before signing.
Ask any vendor to split the quote into lines you can check. A clear vendor will have no trouble doing so.
It also helps to know what fair charges look like in structure, even without exact figures. A one-time setup fee for installing and configuring the server is normal. A monthly support or hosting fee is normal. A charge for custom development, such as a new report or a CRM link, is normal. A recurring charge described only as a ViciDial license, with nothing else explained, is the line to question.
- Which part of this price is the software, and which is hosting, setup or support?
- Is this stock ViciDial or a modified build? If modified, can I get the source of your changes?
- Who owns the server, the database and the call recordings if we stop working together?
- Can I export my leads, dispositions and recordings in a standard format at any time?
- Are the DIDs registered to my company or to yours?
- What does support cover during my shift, which runs at night in PKT or IST?
Free software, paid responsibility
The other thing free does not cover is accountability. When a hosted dialer drops calls, there is a vendor with a contract. When your own ViciDial server drops calls, the answer is whoever you hired. That is not an argument against ViciDial. Many of the best-run floors we know of run it. It is an argument for writing down who owns what before you go live.
Compliance falls in the same bucket. ViciDial has settings for calling hours, DNC lists and drop limits, but having the setting is not the same as having it set correctly for every campaign. Ask your compliance counsel what your campaigns need, and have someone check those settings each week. The abandon rate entry explains one of the numbers worth watching.
What a free ViciDial setup looks like in its first month
To make the point concrete, here is what usually happens when a floor in Pakistan or India sets up ViciDial without buying anything from a ViciDial vendor. Week one, someone installs ViciBox on a rented server and connects a carrier. Calls go out, but audio is one-way on half of them, so the next few evenings go into firewall and NAT settings. Week two, campaigns, lists and statuses get built, and the first agents start dialing.
Week three is usually when the drop rate surprises someone, or the hopper runs dry halfway through the US afternoon because the list was loaded with the wrong time zones. Week four, the floor is running, and the owner realizes nobody has tested a backup. None of this costs a license fee. All of it costs time, and time on a night shift is not free either. Budget for it, or pay someone who has done it many times.
Adding bots without paying for a different dialer
One practical upside of a free, open dialer is that you can add tools on top of it without changing platforms. B3 Voice fronter and verifier bots log into ViciDial the way an agent does, transfer into your closer queue and write dispositions back. Your free dialer stays free. The bots are billed as a flat monthly price per bot with unlimited calls, which you can see on the pricing page, and there is a free trial if you want to see them on your own campaign first.
