No worse than a messenger: voice and video calls appeared in the Gmail application

Google has announced that the Gmail mail application on iOS and Android has the ability to make voice and video calls via Google Chat. This feature was first announced in September this year, but from December 6, it began to roll out to all users of Google services.

It was possible to make calls from the Gmail application before, but this required sending an invitation to your interlocutor to join the conference via Google Meet. As for a normal conversation between two people, it seemed too complicated. Now calls have become much easier – in the upper right corner of the chat there are phone and video call icons, as in popular instant messengers.

This simple addition to the functionality of an email application furthers Google’s primary goal of making Gmail the central hub for all of its communications services. The company said in a message that even if a user starts calling from Google Chat, they will still be redirected to the Gmail app. It is noteworthy that emails are now playing a minor role – they occupy one of four tabs in Gmail, along with Chat, Spaces and Meet.

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