A Soft Phone is a Software Phone. Useful for traveling out of the office, there are Soft Phones available for use on Smart Phones, PC’s and Mac’s.
A Soft Phone will run on your iPhone, BlackBerry, Nokia or Android powered phone as well as your desktop, laptop, PC or Mac. The Soft Phone will operate over a wireless or wired network and can be configured to connect remotely to a VoIP provider or to your VoIP phone system at the office.
When connecting to your VoIP phone system at the office the Soft Phone will operate exactly like any other extension on the phone system, because that’s what it is. Imagine being able to be anywhere in the world and make calls as if you were still at the office. And that’s where the people you call will think you are, based on your caller ID. 
There are two Soft Phones I recommend for a PC or Mac. Both have free versions. One is called X-Lite and the other is Zoiper. Both have paid versions which will give you the ability to make calls over low speed connections. If you have bluetooth on your laptop or desktop computer a bluetooth headset will work well with both X-Lite and Zoiper.
For the iPhone there is the iSip app available. For the BlackBerry there is BlackVoib and now for Android powered phones there is the Bria soft phone from Counterpath® as well as CSipSimple of which I've read good things.
While you can use a Soft Phone to replace a hardware phone in the office, it generally isn’t recommended, as a hardware phone will give you better voice quality, however as computers get faster this is changing and a Soft Phone should be considered as an alternative for a hardware phone. A hard phone won’t be competing for system resources on your laptop or desktop computer as a Soft Phone would. A Soft Phone can be useful and will provide satisfactory voice quality when configured and used correctly.
If you have a question about the proper configuration and use of a Soft Phone, please ask.
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