Google has announced that it will be doing away with Hangouts in favor of other communication platforms within its ecosystem. Google continues to play musical chairs with its communication tools, as the company announced that it will gradually transition Hangouts users into Chat in 2021.
Google on Thursday provided an update for users who still rely on Hangouts to chat with friends and family. The search giant said in the first half of 2021, Hangouts users will be migrated to a free version of Google Chat — the Slack and Discord competitor currently available to enterprise users.
Is Google finally getting rid of Hangouts?
Now, it seems Google is finally pulling the trigger, with plans to eventually scrap Hangouts in favor of Google Chat and Google Meet sometime next year. According to a Google blog post, the company plans to transition all users from Hangouts to Chat within the first half of 2021, leading to the eventually dismantling of Hangouts as a whole.
Another thing we asked ourselves was what happened to Google Hangouts in 2021?
Google continues to play musical chairs with its communication tools, as the company announced that it will gradually transition Hangouts users into Chat in 2021. Google Hangouts has been on the way out for quite a while now.
Google’s eventual shutdown of “Hangouts Classic” has been essentially confirmed since 2018, with the company pushing Google Chat — previously known as “Hangouts Chat” — as the de facto alternative.
Will Google Chat replace Hangouts Chat?
Google has previously confirmed that its Hangouts chat will eventually be replaced by Google Chat for all users, marking yet another turn in the company’s messaging strategy.
Because Hangouts will make way for Chat, that means Google will need to make changes to Hangouts for Google Fi users. That includes removing Fi support in Hangouts early next year.
What does it mean when you see “Hangouts is going away soon”?
Hangouts is displaying certain messages in the app to inform users who continue to use it. “It’s time to switch to Chat”, “Hangouts is going away soon, so switch to Google Chat now. Your recent Hangouts conversations are ready for you in Chat” and “Hangouts is going away soon, so switch to Chat in Gmail now.