Softphone
A softphone is the software call-control panel that a Salesforce agent uses to answer, place, and manage phone calls without a physical desk phone.
Definition
A softphone is the software call-control panel that a Salesforce agent uses to answer, place, and manage phone calls without a physical desk phone. It renders inside a Lightning console app, so answer, hold, transfer, and end sit next to the record the call is about.
Salesforce has two. The native one ships with Salesforce Voice and lives on the Phone tab of the Omni-Channel utility. The other comes from Open CTI, where a telephony partner builds the panel and registers it through a call center definition file.
The two paths are no longer equal. Open CTI is deprecated, closed to newly created Agentforce Service orgs, and retiring on 28 February 2028, so a softphone you build today should be the Salesforce Voice one.
In plain English
“A softphone is a phone that lives on your screen instead of on your desk. You click one button to answer a call and another to hang up. While you talk, the same window shows who is calling and what the company already knows about them.”
Worked example
Priya works support at a home appliance maker running Salesforce Voice. A call arrives from +1 416 555 0182. Omni-Channel routes it to her Tier 2 Appliances queue, and her Omni-Channel Phone tab rings while she is still typing on another case. She clicks Answer. The console pops Contact Marcus Feldt and his open Case 00042917, Status In Progress, Subject Dishwasher leaking at door seal. The live transcript scrolls beside the call controls, so she reads the first fifteen seconds instead of asking him to repeat it. She holds, checks the warranty date on the related Asset, and comes back. When she ends the call, the recording, the transcript, and a Voice Call record are already on Case 00042917.
Two softphones, one console, and one retirement notice
The panel is the visible end of a telephony connection
Salesforce does not carry your voice traffic. A phone system does, and the softphone is the panel that lets an agent drive it from the browser. Click Answer and the panel signals out; the call state comes back and the buttons change. That split explains the setup work. First you wire up a connection, either a Voice contact center or an Open CTI call center definition. Then you assign users to it. Only after that does it matter where the panel sits in the console app. Nothing rings until all three are done, and a panel that never rings is almost never the provider's fault.
Salesforce Voice puts the softphone on the Omni-Channel Phone tab
With Salesforce Voice there is no separate phone widget to add. The softphone is a tab called Phone inside the Omni-Channel utility, beside chat and messaging work. Calls route like any other work item, so queue membership and skills apply to voice as they do to a case. An agent watches one panel rather than a vendor widget parked next to the Omni panel. The native path also writes more back to the record. Transcription scrolls while the customer is still talking. Recordings are stored for quality review, and a Voice Call record lands on the case without anyone typing.
Open CTI is deprecated and on a retirement clock
Open CTI is a JavaScript API that lets a partner render a call-control panel in the browser, with nothing installed on the agent's machine. That was a real improvement on the desktop CTI adapters before it. Salesforce is winding it down. The docs say Open CTI is in maintenance mode, that no new features are being added, and that it retires on 28 February 2028. It is already unavailable for newly created Agentforce Service orgs. Existing implementations keep working until that date, and plenty of large contact centres still run on them. Start a fresh build on it and you have bought yourself a working phone plus a migration project, with the deadline already set.
Softphone layouts still shape the Open CTI panel
On the Open CTI side, a softphone layout decides the panel's contents. You find it under Setup, Quick Find, Softphone Layouts, and assign it by profile. A sales team and a support team can share one phone system and still see different things. A layout covers three areas. Call-related fields, set separately for inbound, outbound, and internal calls. Salesforce objects and the order of the links an agent clicks mid-call. And screen pop behaviour for three outcomes: no matching record, exactly one match, several matches. Creating one requires the Manage Call Centers permission.
Screen pop, click to dial, and paperwork that writes itself
Most of the time a softphone saves is at the edges of a call, not in the middle of it. Click to dial starts an outbound call from a number on a contact, lead, or account, which removes the typing and the transposed digit. Screen pop is the inbound half: the caller is matched against your data and the record opens before the agent says hello. When the match is ambiguous, an Open CTI layout can present a search result list instead of guessing. Logging closes the loop. A task or call log lands on the matched record with time and duration filled in, and Voice adds the recording and transcript. Nobody has to remember to write the call up afterwards.
Get a softphone in front of your agents
These steps follow the Salesforce Voice route. Work them in order. Each one depends on the one before it, and an agent sees nothing in the console until the whole chain is done.
- Confirm Omni-Channel is enabled
From Setup, enter Omni-Channel Settings in the Quick Find box and turn it on. Voice calls arrive as work items, so nothing reaches an agent until it is running.
- Create the contact center and assign agents
Set up your Salesforce Voice contact center for Amazon Connect or a partner telephony provider, then add every agent who needs a phone. Assignment is what makes the panel appear.
- Add the Omni-Channel utility to a console app
In Setup, open App Manager and edit your Lightning console app. Under Utility Items, choose Add Utility Item, then Omni-Channel. The Phone tab appears inside that utility once Voice is live.
- Point the phone channel at a routing rule
Assign an Omni-Channel flow to the phone channel so inbound calls land in a queue with the right skills, instead of ringing whoever is free.
- Test one inbound and one outbound call
Log in as an agent, set Omni presence to available, and ring the number. Watch for the screen pop, then confirm the Voice Call record lands on the right case.
The native panel. It sits on the Phone tab of the Omni-Channel utility and writes transcripts and recordings back to the record.
A partner-built panel registered through a call center definition file. Still functional, in maintenance mode, and on the way out.
Setup, Quick Find, Softphone Layouts. Assigned by profile, and it governs the Open CTI panel's fields, links, and screen pop rules.
- Voice runs only in Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge (Chromium), and Mozilla Firefox. Safari is not on that list. A Mac-heavy floor needs a second browser installed before anyone can take a call.
- A user who is not assigned to the contact center or call center gets a console with no phone in it. Check that first when someone says calls never arrive.
Prefer this walkthrough as its own page? How to Softphone in Salesforce, step by step
How organizations use Softphone
Runs Salesforce Voice so calls are routed by Omni-Channel beside chat, and the transcript is on the case before wrap-up begins.
Kept a partner Open CTI panel for years and is now scoping the move to Salesforce Voice ahead of the retirement date.
Trust & references
Cross-checked against the following references.
- What's a Softphone? (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Salesforce Open CTI (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Phone from a Call Center with Open CTI (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Design and Assign Softphone Layouts (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Answer a Call Using a Softphone (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Salesforce Voice Limits and Limitations (opens in new tab)Salesforce
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Softphone.
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Softphone.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He writes and edits salesforcedictionary.com, published by KineticBit Inc., to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
Test your knowledge
+5 pts / dayQ1. You are scoping a telephony build for an org with no phone system in place today. Which softphone should it use, and why?
Q2. Where does an agent find the softphone in a Salesforce Voice implementation?
Q3. On an existing Open CTI implementation, support agents and sales reps need different fields and different screen pop behaviour on the same phone system. What do you configure?
Discussion
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