Zoom may be one of the best video chat apps, but the free version is going to be a lot less attractive. Ads will appear, and Zoom may try to make a sale when you hang up the call.

Thankfully, this change only affects free users. So those who actually pay for Zoom will be spared this particular change. But in any case, Zoom is certainly going to get paid.

In the blog post announcing this change, Zoom noted that it used to be a tool used primarily by business users. However, with the COVID-19 pandemic, the company is looking to cash in on the massive influx of individuals using the service.

According to Zoom, the pilot advertising program "will support the investment and allow us to continue to offer free basic users access to our robust platform. To us, it sounds like Zoom is saying that advertising is necessary to retain the free tier in the future. [and honestly, given Zoom's growing popularity during last year's lockdown, we're surprised it took them this long to add ads.

But this is another drawback to using Zoom as a free user. After all, meetings for the free tier of three or more people are limited to 40 minutes. Premium users do not have that problem.

The good news is that for the time being, advertising seems to be fairly limited. Premium users, that is, users who pay for Zoom, will not be affected at all. On the other hand, ads will only appear for free users in certain countries, and they will only appear in the browser window after the call ends. Therefore, calls are not interrupted by pop-ups or obtrusive banner ads.

Zoom also tries to make it clear that your meetings, chats, and shared files will not be used for anything related to marketing or third-party advertising. Thus, private conversations are kept private. However, cookies are involved, and Zoom's website has a banner that takes you to the service's cookie management tool.

Of course, even if the ads are modest, as Zoom is piloting, you may have to shell out for a premium account if they are a deal-breaker for you. That's $15 to $20 per month.

Alternatively, you could try one of the other best video chat apps or alternatives to Zoom, many of which have many of the same features as Zoom and are free and ad-free,