The buzzer-and-camera combination bolted beside a lot of front doors - press a button, look at a grainy black-and-white image, buzz someone in - is still what a lot of people picture when they hear "intercom". It is also, at this point, the exception rather than the rule in anything installed new.
Aiphone is what actually dominates what we install, by a wide margin over every other brand in the category. The shift that matters is that a modern IP intercom system runs on the same network as the rest of a site's security gear - cameras, access control - rather than its own dedicated wiring pulled specifically for one buzzer at one door. That means adding a second door station later is a network job, not a re-cabling job.
For a multi-tenant site - an apartment building, a commercial building with several tenancies - the practical difference is that a door station can ring a specific unit or a specific handset rather than every phone in the building at once. Whoever is actually expecting a visitor is the one who gets the call, and everyone else is not interrupted by someone else's delivery.
If a site is already running Hikvision cameras and recorders, their intercom line is worth a specific look - it ties into the same app and the same login as the rest of the Hikvision ecosystem already installed, rather than adding a second system to manage separately. It is not the right call for every site, but it removes a genuine piece of admin overhead for one that is already on that platform.
Not every entrance has network cabling within reach, though - a gate at the far end of a property, or a temporary site office, are common examples. Teleportivity's cellular-connected intercoms cover exactly that case, operating over the mobile network rather than needing a cable run at all, at the cost of an ongoing SIM connection instead of a one-off cabling job.
Tell us what the site looks like - how many entrances, how many people need to answer them, and whether there is already network cabling where the door station needs to go - and we will put together an intercom setup that actually matches it.