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Online Fax for Mac

Sending an online fax on your Mac is easy. Today, we’re going to show you how to quickly and easily send an online fax using different services.

How Do You Want to Online Fax With Your Mac?

There are two ways to send a fax online using your Mac:

Method #1) Sign up for an online fax provider and send a fax using your email address and a standard web browser (like Safari or Chrome)

Method #2) Use the built-in fax function on Mac to send a fax through a phone line connected to your computer

The first method is the most-preferred method. There are dozens of great electronic fax providers that make it easy to send a fax via Mac. However, most of these fax providers charge a small fee, or require you to sign up to a monthly subscription in order to receive faxes.

The second method, on the other hand, is free (provided you have an active phone line). However, it doesn’t work on certain versions of Mac OS X. If you have the latest version of Mac OS X Mavericks, then you should be all right.

Online Fax Services for Mac

Depending on who you ask, there are three or four major email fax providers on the internet today.

These fax providers all make it easy to send and receive faxes using your Mac. These are the same services that let you send and receive faxes using your PC or mobile device.

Sending an virtual fax with the following providers is a lot like sending an email – so if your tablet, phone, desktop, or laptop has email functionality, then it should also have online fax functionality.

How to Send an Online Fax Over Mac

Using a Free Online Fax Website

Step 1) Pick an online fax provider from the businesses listed below. There are two popular free online fax services (MyFax and FaxZero) that let you send 1 or 2 fax pages for free just once – which can be the best solution if you don’t anticipate needing to send a fax again in the near future.

Step 2) Upload the file in a faxable format. For Mac, PDF is the most popular. It’s accepted by virtually every major online fax provider. Alternatively, you can fax Microsoft Word documents.

Step 3) Enter your recipient’s phone number and your own email address. There may also be additional boxes to enter your company name and full name, although these typically aren’t required.

Step 4) Attach a message to your fax number, if you like. This message is typically printed as a separate coverage page with your text written across the page.

Step 5) Once you’ve reviewed the information, click Send to send your fax to the recipient’s fax machine.

How are these online fax services free? Typically, they’re free because they’re supported by ads. Your recipient may receive an advertisement page on their fax machine, or there may be a big logo for the free faxing company on your faxed document. It’s not the most ideal solution for sending legal documents or applying for a job, but it will suit your needs if you need a fast free fax in a pinch on your Mac.

Popular free faxing services include:

  • MyFax.com: Fax for free to 40 countries around the world.
  • FaxZero.om: Fax for free to the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico (choose the advertisement that you wish to display on your fax)

These are the only two major free online fax providers. Alternatively, you may wish to sign up for a free trial with a paid fax provider like eFax, RingCentral, or some of the other providers listed below. These companies typically provide 7 day or 30 day free trials. In many cases, these free trials are full-featured and contain all of the same bells and whistles as an ordinary online fax account (like your own fax number, for example).

Using a Paid Service

Sending an online fax over Mac through a paid service is a little bit different. Here’s how it goes:

Step 1) Create the document that you wish to fax. Depending on your online fax provider, acceptable formats could just be .doc and .pdf. Some online fax providers, however, literally accept hundreds of different document types.

Step 2) Compose a new email using your standard email service (open Gmail on Safari, for example, just like you would if you were sending a normal email).

Step 3) In the To field, type in your recipient’s phone number followed by the website of your online fax service provider. It should look like this: 1234567890@YourOnlineFaxProvider.com. The first number is the 10 digit fax number of your recipient, while the “@ website” part is the website for your online fax provider. The specific address varies between online fax providers, so be sure to check with your online fax provider to make sure your fax gets through.

Step 4) Attach the document you’re trying to fax.

Step 5) Click Send. Your email will be sent to your online fax provider. That online fax provider will convert the attached document into a faxable format. Then, that fax will be forwarded to your recipient’s phone number. That’s it!

Best Online Fax Services for Mac

The most popular online fax services for Mac tend to be the following services:

RingCentral

  • $17.99 Per Month
  • 1500 Incoming + Outgoing Fax Pages Per Month
  • 4.9 cents Per Overage Page

MyFax

  • $10 Per Month
  • 200 Incoming / 100 Outgoing Pages Per Month
  • 10 Cents Per Overage Page

eFax

  • $16.95 Per Month
  • 150 Incoming / 150 Outgoing Pages Per Month
  • 10 Cents Per Overage Page

Nextiva

  • $8.95 Per Month
  • 500 Incoming + Outgoing Fax Pages Per Month
  • 3 Cents Per Overage Page

All of these services work the same way. You create an account, then send faxes using a standard web browser (say, Safari or Chrome on your Mac).

Online Fax Apps for Mac and iPhone

If you’re a Mac user, then you might also have an iPhone. Fortunately, all four of the popular Mac online faxing services also come with their respective iPhone apps. These apps make it straightforward to send and receive faxes via your mobile device:

  • RingCentral App: Lets you manage phone calls, text messages, and faxes all from a single app (free download).
  • MyFax App: Compose, send and receive faxes on your iPhone (free download).
  • eFax App: Receive, sign, and send faxes from your iPhone (free download).
  • Nextiva App: Voice calling, conferencing, and faxing on one platform (free download).

All of the above apps require you to sign into your online faxing account first (or you can create a new account using the app).

Free Faxing from your iPhone

Need to send a fast fax on your iPhone but don’t want to pay to sign up for any of the above companies? There’s an app called Fax Burner that lets you send up to 5 faxed pages for free. You don’t have to sign up with a credit card or anything.

Download Fax Burner here.

How to Send an Online Fax Using Software That’s Already On Your Mac

Your Mac actually already has a faxing application built-in. All you need is a modem connected to a phone line. If you’ve got that, then you can send a fax using your Mac by following the instructions listed here:

Mac OS X Mavericks

Step 1) Open the document you wish to fax, then go to File > Print

Step 2) Choose Fax PDF from the PDF pop-up menu, then select your fax machine from the Printer pop-up menu. Your fax machine doesn’t necessarily have to be a separate device. Check out the Apple Support article here for more info.

Step 3) Enter your recipient’s fax number by typing it into the To field. You can also select from your saved list of numbers by clicking the Contacts button to the right of the To field, where you then select a number.

Step 4) Some phone systems require you to dial an exit number to leave the internal network. If that’s the case, type that number into the Dialing Prefix field.

Step 5) You can include a cover page by selecting the Use cover page option. Then, enter your subject and message. It will appear on the cover page in standard text before the faxed document.

Step 6) You can change your options further by using the print options pop-up menu, which is the pop-up menu within a separator bar. You can use these settings to control how your modem behaves when faxing, for example. Just click Fax Modem. You can also choose whether to dial with touch tones or pulse tones, or whether you want to listen to the modem as it dials. You can ignore most of these settings if you like.

Step 7) Click Fax. Your fax will be sent to your recipient’s number.

That fax will be sent as soon as your modem is available. If you’re currently using your modem to connect to the internet, then your fax will be sent after you disconnect from your ISP.

Your fax will feature a header section that includes the date and time the fax was sent along with a page number and the fax number of the sender (you).

About Johnson Hur

After having graduated with a degree in Finance and working for a Fortune 500 company for several years, Johnson decided to follow his passion by embarking on a path to the digital world. He has over 8 years of experience with large companies setting marketing strategy.

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