In Spring 2019 Google announced the transition from classic Hangouts to Hangouts Chat. As well, Meet is replacing the video conferencing function. Both have a modern user interface and Chat has team rooms that support better collaboration.
Hangouts Chat Training & Help
This short video demonstrates the new Chat
Creating direct messages & rooms
- Chat web interface: chat.google.com
- Chat mobile apps: Android or iOS
- Standalone desktop app: You can download the desktop app from this link: https://chat.google.com/download/
- Hangouts Meet has many benefits over the traditional Google Hangout video including being able to schedule a Meet, screen sharing, and up to 50 participants.
Troubleshooting:
- Hangouts Chat is configured to require chat history to be on however Google does allow users to toggle it off. If the history is toggled off you will not be able to receive messages and the sender will get the following error:
- If you have the classic chat turned on in your Gmail settings you will get a pop up error until this is turned off. Instructions for that can be found here: Chat Error In Gmail