Google has officially called time on its Hangouts platform on November 1 as users are now automatically switched to Chat.
Hangouts have slowly been phased out since it was announced in 2020 that the platform would change to Chat in November 2022.
By mid-year 2022, Google ensured that users no longer had access to the Hangouts mobile app or the Chrome extension on the web browser.
In June this year, Ravi Kanneganti, Product Manager, Google Chat, said: “In October 2020, we announced Google Chat would be available for everyone.
“Since then, people could continue using Hangouts or upgrade to Google Chat — available as its own app or within Gmail — to take advantage of its modern features and integration with other Workspace products.
“We’ve continued to invest in Chat to help people better collaborate and express themselves, and now we’re taking steps to help remaining Hangouts users move to Chat.”
Hangouts conversations will be automatically transferred to Chat to ensure that users can pick up messages from where they left off.
Despite the automatic transfer, Google urges users to keep a copy of their Hangouts data using Google Takeout to back it up.
Google has confirmed that Hangouts users can use Takeout to download their data from the platform until January 1, 2023.
After that deadline, any data from the Hangouts platform will no longer be available.
According to Google, moving to Chat opens up “new and better ways to connect and collaborate”.
Users can edit Docs, Slides, or Sheets with side-by-side editing or access Spaces for a dedicated place for topic-based collaboration.
Google Chat is also integrated into Gmail to make it easier to use Chat alongside a user’s inbox, Spaces, and Meet.
At the end of October, Google announced that it is expanding the capabilities of its Workspace Individual platform by adding several features to help solo business owners around the world.
The company has increased the cloud storage capacity, advanced email personalisation and made the platform available in new global regions.
Google hopes the changes will allow solo business owners to improve the experience for themselves, their customers, and their partners.
The company has also continued its promise to improve the Workspace experience for Android users, especially those on tablets.
Google aims to make it easier for Android users to see their colleague’s availability and organise content.
Updates included viewing colleagues’ out-of-office banners and improvements to the platform on larger-screened devices.
