What is POTS?

POTS, an acronym for Plain Old Telephone Service, refers to the traditional, analog voice transmission system that was the global standard for telecommunications for most of the 20th century. It is the foundational technology upon which the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) was built.

POTS works by transmitting voice signals as continuous electrical waves over a physical network of copper wires. For decades, it was the primary method for making and receiving phone calls for both homes and businesses.

While historically significant, POTS is now considered a legacy technology. Its capabilities are extremely limited compared to modern digital and IP-based solutions. Major telecommunication carriers worldwide have been actively phasing out their old analog and ISDN infrastructure in favor of more efficient, flexible, and feature-rich IP networks.

As businesses have overwhelmingly transitioned to Voice over IP (VoIP) and cloud communication platforms, the term POTS is now used almost exclusively in a historical context to describe the old analog phone system that modern technology has replaced.