Google believes in the future of video chat and is looking at making it easier to access, announcing today that they will be integrating their video calling app Duo into the Dialler, Messaging and Contacts app on Nexus, Pixel and Android One phones.
Google is integrating Duo in the Dialler, Messaging and Contacts apps on these devices making it easy to make a video call when texting or calling someone with a simple tap. They’re also looking to integrate Duo into voice calls to let you switch to a video chat mid-call.
The aim is to work with carriers globally to make the video call component automatically use the ViLTE service of your LTE connection if it’s supported. Obviously if no ViLTE is available it will just use the standard data connection.
Working with carriers to include the requisite ViLTE switches adds layers of complexity to the rollout that Google is already having implementing Rich Communication Services (RCS).
The inclusion of Duo and Allo by default as Google Apps has indeed grown the install base of the apps, but actual user base has likely not grown. Allo remains shy key features for most modern chat users compared to the competition, but Duo has been a little more useful to me at least, allowing video chat in some pretty terrible network conditions while travelling, so more Duo is ok by me.
We’ll soon find out how this goes for Google and Duo, chime in below if you use Duo…or Allo on a regular basis.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.tachyon
