
Introducing free voice calls from Hangouts - Anon84
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2014/09/call-me-maybe-introducing-free-voice.html
======
untog
According to /r/android this also finally brings Google Voice into Hangouts:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/2fz6hh/hangouts_and...](http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/2fz6hh/hangouts_and_google_voicefinally_merged/)

I haven't seen the update yet to try it, but am hoping I do soon. This is
long, long overdue.

All this said - Hangouts on desktop is _still_ so much worse than GChat was -
and GChat had free calls too. I'd type a number, two seconds later it would be
ringing in the bottom right corner. Now, a Hangout window opens, the Hangouts
plugin loads, my CPU goes haywire...

~~~
cantbecool
I stand 100% behind your statement. I can't stand to use Hangouts. I remember
when you could simply have a video chat plugin installed in Google Chat with
HD feature enabled in labs and CPU usage wouldn't be a quarter what a video
chat in Hangouts is now. I dream that they still had the option to use the
older video chat functionality.

~~~
vidarh
Video chat options in general frustrate me to no end. Skype - at least on
Linux - have steadily dropped in quality over the last few years (the old
cynic in me wants to blame MS for no particular reason). Back in 2006-2007 I
used Skype video chats daily with few issues between the UK and California.
These days I have problems getting it to work reliably within London, and have
given up on it to let my son talk to his grandmother in Norway.

So I tried Google Hangouts. It's marginally better. But it's still _awful_ ,
and odds are about 50% that one or the other end of just fails to work
(suddenly wants to reinstall the plugin, or just plain refuses to recognize
the camera).

It's just incredible to me that a decade after I had reliable, working video
chat, things appears to have gotten steadily _worse_ , not better... I have 10
times the bandwidth - or more -, for example, both up and down.

~~~
DAddYE
I'll be down-voted, although I solved the problem with: .. FaceTime. If you
don't have a mac you can get a ipod touch. That's what I use to talk with my
family USA->Italy. Is the only thing I found that is reliable and has a quite
good quality.

~~~
pbreit
This is what's so annoying about Apple: why no Android client? How can you
hope to have a communications platform that is so severely constrained? That's
why so few here barely even know about Facetime. You can't invest in it
because it's so limited.

~~~
jodrellblank
'hope to'? They don't hope to, it exists. 15-20 million FaceTime calls every
day: [http://www.macrumors.com/2014/02/28/apple-40-billion-
imessag...](http://www.macrumors.com/2014/02/28/apple-40-billion-imessages/)

~~~
pbreit
So 8% of users try it once per day? I'm wondering how that compares to phone,
messages, email, whatsapp, Skype, etc? Very poorly, I'd say.

------
chakalakasp
This has been available on iOS for a long time, which I found to be really,
really strange, given that you would think Android would be the platform where
they'd want to put their more advanced features.

It isn't half bad, though -- the call quality, even when the call terminates
in an actual phone number, exceeds that of cellular by a good margin, due to
what I assume is a much better bitrate being used. And it works even if you
don't have a Google Voice account. This is nice, because I can fire it up and
make a phone call to a customer (I work for an MSP) without giving away my
cell phone number. This is important to me because if all my customers had my
cell number, I'd have to change it constantly or never have peace.

 _edit_ BTW, some pitfalls of this I have discovered. Depending on how well
your cell handles handoffs between Wifi and LTE, your call may be dropped as
you walk away from a Wifi hotspot. It works over 3G, but not well. The ringer
for Hangouts on iOS is almost impossible to notice, so if you get an incoming
GV call, good luck with that. I have had a good number of randomly dropped
calls that I could not trace back to a cause. If you get an incoming REAL
phone call on your real phone number, Hangouts (at least on iOS) immediately
boots you out of your Hangouts call, even if the Hangouts call is on Wifi.
(With Verizon, voice call kills LTE data stream, so this is to be expected,
but with Wifi... not to be expected.)

~~~
milhous
Are we to assume that with this update, we can finally get rid of the old
"Google Voice" app to do text messaging and playback voicemail?

For my use case, I ditched my iPhone 4S last year and got a Retina iPad mini
with a prepaid Verizon data plan. It's pretty good, though there needs to be
better integration between Hangouts and iOS. For example, if I get an incoming
call notification, it sometimes will not automatically open Hangouts to
receive the call. It would take me to the Home screen, then I have to open
Hangouts in hopes that I can answer the call in time. If iPad's locked, then I
have to act fast to enter the passcode and launch Hangouts manually.

This many not really be a problem with Hangouts than it is that iOS doesn't
support deep integration with 3rd party telephony, so that the experience is
no different from receiving a native phone call on an iPhone. Other small
complaints are that the push notification (incoming call) sound persists for a
few seconds after the call's connected, and that it only shows me the phone
number of the incoming call and doesn't display the contact's name if it's in
my contacts.

Considering I don't use the phone much, and have saved a lot of money by not
subscribing to a smartphone plan, this overall was a good experiment. But I'll
be going back to an iPhone soon because it's been a burden carrying an iPad
everywhere for the past year. With Wi-fi calling now available in iOS8, I'll
probably try out T-Mobile's test drive and if the coverage is good enough in
my area, will probably sign up for it since they have the cheapest plans.

~~~
lepht
Unfortunately, as far as I can tell you still need to dedicated GV app. It was
however just updated today:

\- Updated user interface to match iOS7 guidelines \- Bug fixes and
performance enhancements \- Support for Google Voice integration in Hangouts

------
nkoren
Until Hangouts provide the ability to properly control one's visibility, I
Will. Not. Use. Them. Full. Stop.

It's somewhat amusing to see Google finally reintroducing functionality which
worked perfectly well in GChat years ago. But sad when I reflect on how I now
spend so much less time using the Google ecosystem, thanks to their constant
dismantling (Reader), deprecation (GChat), divestment (Sketchup), and defacing
(Gmail/maps UX/UI) of software which I once relied upon. Google is still doing
many things right; why are they consistently getting certain things so wrong?

~~~
chris_va
Out of curiosity, did you happen to pay for any of those things you are
complaining about?

Edit: To folks down voting... That is totally fair, this was a useless
negative comment on my part.

Regardless, it seems unnecessary to avoid using a product that it might get
changed.

~~~
nkoren
Actually, yes. I paid for Sketchup and for extra storage space on gmail /
drive. I also paid for Google Apps for Business for two of my startups. My
disgruntlement isn't because I'm upset that I didn't get what I paid for, but
because Google's practices have become primarily damaging to themselves: I
don't think it is helping them win eyeballs.

Personally, I date this to the announcement that they would be putting "more
wood behind fewer arrows".[1] Prior to that, Google's product offerings had
been comprehensive but scattershot -- but most of their individual products
were lean, elegant, and very effective at what they did. By putting "more
wood" into those products, they've somehow fallen into a very old-world
fallacy of software development: the idea that quality scales with manpower.
But overloading a team with software engineers doesn't produce better software
-- just _bloated_ software. As somebody who is generally an admirer of
Google's, I find this unfortunate.

1: [http://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/more-wood-behind-
fe...](http://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/more-wood-behind-fewer-
arrows.html)

------
flavor8
Fine, but I wish they'd stop breaking some of the core features in hangouts.
Since fairly recently, non google users are unable to get into video hangouts
via new-style (non _/ _/calendar/_) google calendar created links.
Uberconference integration doesn't consistently work. Screenshare (since the
plugin was phased out) doesn't work in chromium/ubuntu, but does in firefox.
I've reported all of these issues in the product forums, but haven't seen
resolution on any of them.

I know google isn't "into QA", but for such a core product it's remarkably
flaky.

~~~
silverbax88
I honestly just wish Google would stop breaking core features in _any_ of
their applications.

------
furyg3
Maybe it's just me, but I've had this functionality on the iOS version of
Hangouts for a while (I already have Google Voice). Outgoing phone calls from
Hangouts show my GV number as caller ID. Incoming calls also ring on my
Hangouts app. I did not know that that wasn't available for Android users...

Anyway, it's very handy. I have a US Google Voice account, but live abroad.
Calls from hangouts are the primary way I talk to my friends and family back
home. Wifi or a _very_ strong 4G signal is required, 3G doesn't really cut it.

~~~
untog
Yes, amazingly, this has been available on iOS and _not_ on Android.

~~~
blacksmith_tb
Maybe GOOG didn't mind testing the beta on iOS users?

------
davidw
Didn't this used to work fine with Google Voice and Google Chat? Then they
broke it, and now it's fixed?

Lately, Google Hangouts has been giving me abysmal results when talking to my
parents in the US. The video freezes every minute or so, and even voice only
doesn't work so well. It used to work much better.

~~~
xhrpost
The Google Voice app still did a traditional cellular call to my knowledge.
You had to get a third party app like GrooVe IP in order to make a data call
via the Google Voice system.

~~~
wlesieutre
They had a phone system built into Gmail's web interface, which IIRC could be
treated the same as any other forwarding phone in GV. So when someone called
me, it'd ring on my computer and on my phone, and I could answer either of
them.

I don't recall personally placing any calls from the Gmail interface, but I
think the functionality existed.

~~~
maxerickson
The call out from Gmail is still present.

~~~
wlesieutre
Good to know. I still _have_ Google Voice, but I've more or less stopped
paying attention to its development... but maybe I'll use that call-from-Gmail
feature.

iOS client is abandoned (it's the only app I have that hasn't been updated for
iOS 7), and Google blocked access for the 3rd party clients (killing
GrowlVoice, which was better than any of Google's clients, and which I paid
money for). Not to mention MMS still doesn't work, so any group texts or
pictures sent to me disappear into the ether and make me look like an
antisocial curmudgeon who never responds to anything. Blah.

I paid $20 to port my number in, but I'll be moving it back out to a real
carrier next time I'm switching phones/plans around.

~~~
wlesieutre
Missed my window to edit parent, but the iPhone client finally got an iOS 7
update today, alongside the new version of hangouts. Maybe I won't write it
off yet after all. Yay!

EDIT: New version is designed for tall screens, and does _not_ hold up well on
the 4S and earlier.

[http://i.imgur.com/l3heAjJ.png](http://i.imgur.com/l3heAjJ.png)

The keyboard and input box are basically a fixed size, and then out of the
leftover space they've used more than 2/3s to tell me who I'm talking to
(twice). The remaining little stripe has enough room to display a single line
text, or two if you don't mind the name/time getting chopped off.

------
kilovoltaire
Just in case anyone else was wondering what the most expensive rate is...

    
    
      Array.prototype.slice.call($$('td')).sort(function(a, b) { return parseInt(a.textContent.replace(/\D+/g, "")) - parseInt(b.textContent.replace(/\D+/g, "")); }).slice(-1)[0].parentNode
    

Satellite Service - Thuraya $7.25 per minute

~~~
toomuchtodo
Huh, I would've thought it was Iridium.

------
aviv
Shameless plug: if anyone is interested in helping a startup test out their
VoIP infrastructure, let me know (email in profile) and I'll hook you up with
a free SIP trunk you can use for a while for both domestic and international
calls. Conversational traffic only please, no automated dialers of any kind.
To be used with any SIP client of your choice.

~~~
namtab00
I may be interested for some international calls..

------
mcintyre1994
"it’s free to call numbers in the U.S. and Canada"

It's great that expensive international calls are a thing of the past by now
but is this really the right way to go? I'm in the UK - do I have to pay
international rates to call UK numbers or will I just not be able to call from
the UK 'yet'?

~~~
scrollaway
You'll pay international rates, sadly.

It's annoying they're not rolling out to more countries but then again, I
can't really complain - I still get to call any number in the US for free and
I use my regular operator for local calls.

------
gchp
Free in price perhaps, but I'm not sure how readily I'm going to start using
this. Call me paranoid but voice calls are probably the one part of my life
right now that Google don't have access to. I just don't know how I feel about
handing another piece of information over to them. It's not even that it's
Google - I'd say the same thing for any other corporation trying this. I
removed Facebook from my phone for this very reason. Just makes me feel that
little bit uneasy.

~~~
soup10
You should know it's an open secret now that the NSA has racks of hardware at
telecom data centers which record your calls and has for a while. On the other
hand the big corps don't care unless they can profit from it. Privacy by
apathy.

~~~
walden42
Certainly this makes it easier on the government if they really wanted your
calls.

~~~
tsunamifury
At least you get 1024 bit encryption end to end with google

------
shmerl
It's really sad that Google took all that direction with Hangouts.

Now requesting any bug fixes for federated Google Talk is just pointless.
Google completely ignores them under excuse that "Hangouts is the way now".

For example there is no hope they'll fix server to server encryption which
they don't provide in Google Talk federation, which cut off all contacts from
there since a lot of servers now make such encryption mandatory.

------
AdmiralAsshat
Finally. Now when I'm in my basement I can at least wifi-call my family from
my cellphone instead of having to open up my damn laptop to call from a Chrome
gmail browser tab.

~~~
Revex
You could have been doing this for some time now. I have by using something
like TalkATone or GrooveIp.

~~~
AdmiralAsshat
I did, in fact, use one of them for some time. Then it was discontinued,
because Google killed the ability to utilize the number through their API.

------
michokest
I wish Google would take a second to try their own iOS dialer in real-life
scenarios:

1) Paste an international number like +34 911 111 111 from the web to
Hangouts: it gets pasted as 34911111111, losing the +

2) They don't follow the standard text input element, so it's not possible to
go to the beginning of the line and add a +

3) ... now you're stuck with app switching and TYPING NUMBERS IN, NUMBER BY
NUMBER

There's that and then there's the horrible Hangouts video chat experience. I
can't count how many hours I've wasted trying to explain other people how to
join a call or share their screen before giving up and doing a voice call or
skype.

------
wiredfool
Please please please don't screw up Google Voice.

~~~
wiredfool
Tap on Send Message or Start a Call

    
    
      "Type an name, email, number or circle"
    

me: ok, [home landline number]

    
    
      Find on hangouts: [Home landline number] is not 
      on hangouts, would you like to invite via SMS?
    

me: wtf.

[edit -- it appears that I still haven't been gifted with the new Hangouts.]

------
eitally
Beware to everyone setting incoming Voice calls to ring in Hangouts. YOU NEED
TO DISABLE THIS FEATURE IN VOICE AT THE SAME TIME, or your phone will ring in
two different apps, and continue ringing in the second one even after you
answer the call in the first one (no matter whether that's the Android Phone
app or Hangouts). This embarrassed me on a business call today.

------
ErikRogneby
I can install the dialer, but can't seem to find the 2.3 upgrade from 2.1.2.
You'd think this would work on a Nexus 4. _EDIT_ "To get started on Android,
just grab the new version of Hangouts (v2.3, rolling out over the next few
days),"

Why release the dialer in the play store if it requires a yet to be released
updated hangouts version?

~~~
eitally
Google often does rolling releases.

~~~
dragonwriter
It would be good if they would better manage dependencies with those, so that
if you can install the Dialer from the Store, you can also install the version
of Hangouts on which it depends.

------
abcdefidk
So.....

Why are we paying for ginormously expensive cell phone bills again? With a
wifi connection, you can now:

Talk

Text

Send MMS (think Snapchat)

Do everything else smartphone-wise.

I know a few things that might run into issues - you can't take a call while
on the road without cell service. GPS would be a no-go. Things like Google
Maps and Nike Running wouldn't work.

But aside from that.... what good reasons still exist for having a cell phone
bill?

~~~
jacquesm
> But aside from that.... what good reasons still exist for having a cell
> phone bill?

Coverage. Cell phones are much longer range than wi-fi.

For instance, you couldn't make a wi-fi call out of your car without using the
cell network. So if your cell phone is connected to the net in your car then
you're using the cellular modem, not the wifi one.

~~~
ejr
I think widespread 3G is making the range less of an issue now. I can see
providers - third party or not - using existing cellular networks offering
data-only plans that make this far more feasible.

~~~
jacquesm
You'd just be exchanging your 'cell phone bill' with a 'data plan bill'. The
phone company really doesn't care if you stick that SIM in a tablet or in a
phone.

From the phone company's view there are only data networks, voice networks are
dying out. Voice is just another form of data.

~~~
chrisan
You would think they only view it as data networks!

Instead, Verizon for example, likes to charge per minute, text message, and
media message if you are not on an "unlimited" (which is actually limited
unless you are truly grandfathered in from an unlimited plan)

I think a lot of people would welcome a 'data plan bill' only and get rid of
the nickel and diming

~~~
jacquesm
Of course they do. That's abusing peoples misunderstanding of how this all
works under the hood. The whole notion of 'air time' makes 0 sense with a cell
phone, the phone is off the air more than 90% of the time even while a
conversation is in progress.

------
pouzy
Well, this took a while. It's been the most frustrating experience having
Hangouts since it rolled out, because of this exact issue: I based everything
on GrooveIP at the time, having a small voice plan but unlimited data. Then
Hangouts showed up and everything became messy (I still hate hangouts, putting
SMS and web chat at the same place is very confusing for the average user)

I wrote this a bit more that a year ago about how all of Google's products are
becoming too complicated: [http://oneurl.me/google-my-mom-cant-use-your-new-
products](http://oneurl.me/google-my-mom-cant-use-your-new-products)

This is all linked to the Google+ spirit: Trying to make things work when they
clearly don't.

The GV/hangouts app hasn't been rolled out on my phone yet, but I'm looking
forward to see what complications it creates :)

~~~
Pxtl
> (I still hate hangouts, putting SMS and web chat at the same place is very
> confusing for the average user

Apple and WinPhone do this fine and it's an excellent idea in a world where
SMS is overpriced that the app should automatically look for free ways to get
the message to the target seamlessly.

I look at Hangouts the same as I look at Plus - great idea to integrate the
myriad things into one place and consolidate a zillion balkanized Google
products... but Google just isn't good at doing that.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Apple and WinPhone do this fine and it's an excellent idea in a world where
> SMS is overpriced that the app should automatically look for free ways to
> get the message to the target seamlessly.

Smartphone plans with unlimited text and limited data with a high surchage for
overages are easier to find than ones with limited SMS and unlimited data, so
its not really clear that "SMS is overpriced" anymore, especially when
compared with data.

~~~
Pxtl
Wifi is free and Hangouts messages are tiny anyways. The bigger concern is
avoiding accidentally sendning a message to a user who isn't connected to
Hangouts through their primary device - I've often found Hangouts messages
waiting for me on my tablet at home.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Wifi is free

In places that have free WiFi (or where you've already paid for it), WiFi is
free or at least has a zero marginal cost per byte. But that's usually not
everywhere people use phones.

------
smeyer
Is this still possible from gchat? That used to be (and possibly still is) an
option if I recall correctly.

~~~
gk1
Gchat is now called Hangouts.

~~~
smeyer
So did they take the ability away and then bring it back or was it
persistently available?

~~~
gk1
I have no idea. The gchat/gmail/hangout integration has been confusing me for
many months. To this day I'm never really sure where I'm signed in to any of
them or just some of them or none of them.

------
duked
I tried to look at the details but couldn't find out, so may be someone has
the answer. Do I need to have a google+ account to use hangout or my gmail
address is fine ? I just don't want a g+ account and don't want to be tricked
into creating one by mistake.

~~~
esteth
I'm not sure I understand why you don't want your account to have a private G+
page. Why would you miss out on a service you like because you don't want to
have to not use another one?

~~~
duked
Because I don't like to feel forced to create an account for a company to
simply inflate their number of user for a service a absolutely don't want to
use (G+). I have no FB, no twitter and no G+ as a personal choice. If hangout
requires G+ then I'll pass. I'm happy to pay for a service with dollars but
not with my personal data.

------
khc
Can this hand off between Wifi and data? Multipath TCP?

------
mncolinlee
Who needs a voice plan now?

You can also receive calls on your Google Voice number in Hangouts. This means
that if you have data service, you can make and receive calls.

It seems the best argument for a voice and SMS plan nowadays is for traveling
in areas where data coverage is poor or spotty.

~~~
zaphoyd
How do I not get a voice plan? (tablet aside) Nearly all decent data plans (in
the US at least) have a mandatory unlimited voice/SMS bundled.

~~~
mncolinlee
Several carriers offer them and the ones that do will win price-sensitive
customers.

T-Mobile: [http://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phone-plans/mobile-
internet.htm...](http://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phone-plans/mobile-
internet.html)

U.S. Cellular: [http://m.uscellular.com/uscellular/plans/data-only-
plan.html](http://m.uscellular.com/uscellular/plans/data-only-plan.html)

[http://www.popsugar.com/tech/Data-Only-
Plans-26912644](http://www.popsugar.com/tech/Data-Only-Plans-26912644)

Also, T-mobile offers free international data in many, many countries. This
may offer a cheaper option than international voice calls for callers with
traditional plans.

~~~
toomuchtodo
T-Mobile has a $30/month 5G 4G data, unlimited text, 100 voice minutes plan
available, but you can only activate at Walmart or on T-Mobile.com

EDIT:

[http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/prepaid-plans](http://prepaid-
phones.t-mobile.com/prepaid-plans)

[http://i.imgur.com/5aQ7LRy.png](http://i.imgur.com/5aQ7LRy.png)

~~~
mdaniel
I have Brightspot, which is a pre-paid MVNO on T-Mobile, and it has been my
experience that I cannot use my Google Voice number for voicemail like I could
with a post-paid account, and I am experiencing that a lot of the short-code
messaging services can't reach me, either. I haven't tried _sending_ an SMS to
a short-code service, but my suspicion is "no" on that, too.

Also, and this may be T-Mobile wide, I am experiencing that they are routing
all voice traffic over the data line, which means poor coverage now results in
ch-op-py dr-op-ou-t speech just like a bad SIP line would. I tried to make a
call last weekend and the other end sounded just like a modem it was so bad.

Just caveat emptor.

------
jebblue
I've been using this on Ubuntu Desktop for several months instead of the older
GTalk. It works great for plain numbers too, just click in the field to give
it the focus and type or paste in your plain number to dial.

------
leni536
I'm using a sip provider with much better international call rates than this,
however I understand that free calls in the US is really good. I don't have
contacts in the US though.

I'm using voipstunt.com now with qutecom (after I really fed up with Skype)
but there are many similar providers. I'm making phone calls 0.01 EUR/min +
VAT to mobile in Hungary (where I live) which is not free but still much
better than other providers here.

Also I could bind my phone number so others can see my number when they
receive my calls so they can call me back. I don't know if hangouts handles
that.

~~~
icebraining
How's the quality of your provider? I've been using MegaVOIP (also fed up with
Skype) and it's getting terrible.

~~~
leni536
It's usable for conversations.

------
djyaz1200
This is all headed to one login for all your email, sms, chat, etc. Gmail,
Hangouts, Voice are all converging. Communication is far more valuable from a
data science (aka marketing) standpoint than "social." Who you have as a
"connection" on any network is nearly meaningless now, however who you
actually talk to is very valuable information. This is why (not trying to
start a political discussion) NSA stores meta data about who people talk to on
the phone.

------
AndrewBissell
I've been running without a full wireless plan for a little over a year now. I
just connect my phone to the MiFi I have for work and route calls to a Google
Voice number through a privately-run SIP server. Using SIP was always a little
spotty and inconsistent, so I'm looking forward to trying out the Hangouts
calls.

If you're tired of paying wireless carriers $90/month I think this makes data-
only solutions much easier to use now.

~~~
r00fus
Where are you paying $90/mo for a wireless plan? Thanks to T-Mobile, rates for
all other carriers have come down too and unlimited minutes are very easy to
obtain.

I pay $22 per line for my mobile, with unlimited minutes - last month I used
2200 minutes personally on my line and my family used close to 5000. All
included.

------
davidradcliffe
I've only used google voice for the incoming calls and voicemail features.
Hopefully those don't get lost in the shuffle.

------
jrochkind1
> you can make voice calls from Hangouts on Android, iOS and the web.

How do I get to google hangouts on the web, and use it to make free calls? I
can't even find a google hangouts on the web, googling for it just sends me to
things suggesting I download an app.

~~~
gangstead
Gmail. Right hand side.

~~~
jrochkind1
ha, and there's a little phone icon, indeed!

Very nice. There are times I have wifi but no phone, and need to make a quick
US phone call.

I'm not sure most people know the sidebar of gmail as "Google Hangouts for the
web", rather than "the contacts list in the sidebar of gmail", but okay then!

~~~
iamdave
There's also a Chrome Add on which will drop a little icon in your system
tray, which clicking brings up a window in the bottom of your screen which you
can start calls with as well.

------
donniezazen
All my devices are incompatible with Hangouts Dialer. Is the dialer only for
Google Voice users. I can call US from international locations without GV
number and I have wanted this on phone for so long. Does anyone have any
information?

------
Watabou
It also looks like they finally updated Google Voice for iOS 7. You know, a
week before iOS 8 is released.

Hey I'm happy though! This means all my apps finally have the design of iOS 7.

I hope they have fixed the notification bug that plagued the previous version.

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gk1
This is great and comes just in time for me. I'm close to my monthly minutes
limit and have resorted to using Hangouts and Skype, where I still have some
credits remaining. Now it'll be a no-brainer, if the calls are free.

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aggieben
Not sure I get it....didn't Hangouts already do this? I've been making
outgoing calls from Hangouts for months, at least. Edit: _ooooohhhh_ , this is
just Android catching up to the rest of us. Got it.

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eyeareque
I was really hoping the Google Voice app for iOS would get another update, but
that seems even more unlikely now.

Sadly, I cannot use my main gmail account with hangouts, as I don't want to
create a google+ account for it. Oh well.

~~~
eyeareque
I eat my words. Today I was pleasantly surprised to see that Google finally
made an update to the iOS Google voice app.

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drewr
I would rather audio text message. I want something like Glide, but without
video. Sometimes a txt doesn't do it, but I don't want to enter into the time-
consuming ceremony of a phone call/voicemail.

~~~
genesee
My company, my family, and my friends all use Voxer for this. It's a great
free push-to-talk style chat app, and we love the hybrid a/synchronous model
of communication.

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higherpurpose
> it’s free to call numbers in the U.S. and Canada, and the international
> rates are really low

So is it free to call a US number from another country, too? Or only if you
call from inside US?

~~~
murali44
It's free to call US and Canada from anywhere in the world. It just uses your
data.

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vmarsy
Weren't the calls already free on Google Voice for years?

~~~
darkstar999
It wasn't integrated with Google Hangouts / Gmail Chat. (well it was before
they migrated from the old chat to Hangouts).

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lutusp
This might be premature. I still can't use Hangouts to make voice-only calls,
and I end up going back to its predecessor over and over.

When I try to use Hangouts for ordinary phone calls, the system assumes I want
a video chat, and can't seem to understand that I want to use my USB headset,
not the microphone on the video camera and the system speakers, for a voice-
only call. I've never been able to train the system to default to the USB
headset and leave the video camera out of the equation.

I'm going to try the new version on principle, but I have serious doubts.

------
Zikes
I wonder if this is why I haven't been getting notifications for text messages
on my Google Voice number for the past couple of months.

------
veidr
I've been making free calls from the Hangouts app on my iPhone for many
months. What's new about this?

I read the post nothing jumps out at me.

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ulfw
Introducing the simple rebranding/reworking of Google Voice into Hangouts.

(the same 'free calls' have been on Google Voice for years)

~~~
notatoad
Google Voice has _not_ made VOIP calls from your phone. This is a new feature.
Before, it made calls with your google voice number but using your phone's
minutes

~~~
ulfw
Fair enough. They were from my desktop only or with a third-party app on my
iPhone.

------
philchambers
[http://g2m.me/](http://g2m.me/) \- GoToMeeting's new WebRTC Free product is
decent.

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broabprobe
This is new? I've been using Hangouts on my iPhone as the only way I make
calls for over a year now...

------
s3r3nity
Why is this front page? Facebook has had free voice calls in their messaging
app for almost a year now.

------
lxfontes
tinfoil alert

your data will flow through google's RTP proxies (see STUN/TURN). Probably in
US.

------
spacefight
Introducing free full voice capture and voice analysis via your favorite NSL.

------
460200
This is the best! Only a data connection will be needed now for everything.

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toyg
Does this mean us European peons can finally use Google Voice...?

~~~
lmedinas
We could use Voice since some time ago but without Free calls. Now we have an
additional feature VOIP which you get calls between Hangouts users for free.

------
cranklin
Now, when will they re-enable hangouts on google glass?

------
benbristow
Not in the UK as per usual. Thanks Google.

------
findjashua
Goodbye Skype! You won't be missed.

~~~
darklrd
Yup. How would Skype fight this?

~~~
peterwwillis
Skype is available on more platforms, including Blackberry, Windows Phone, OS
X, 'Skype Landlines', Kindle Fire HD, TVs, Xbox, Playstation, even iPod.

Skype is a standalone application where the only account you need is a Skype
one, which is free, and isn't tied to any personal information other than an
e-mail address.

If you've ever tried to run Hangouts from a 'non-supported' operating system /
distribution / architecture / browser / mobile device, it doesn't freaking
work. It's not designed as a proper stand-alone application so it simply
doesn't work on platforms it wasn't designed for. Skype is a static
application designed to run on basically anything.

Google appears to be the one lagging behind both Apple and Microsoft in terms
of shipping free video calling with their platform. They have a lot of ground
to cover in terms of user experience and getting users to switch from the
established Skype and Facetime camps.

~~~
sesqu
> Skype is a standalone application where the only account you need is a Skype
> one, which is free, and isn't tied to any personal information other than an
> e-mail address.

When Microsoft bought Skype, I seem to recall them requiring all new users to
use a Microsoft account instead of a Skype account. That isn't the case now,
and it may have just been a confusing installer at the time, but it's a
concern.

------
miah_
I can't wait for my voice call to be interrupted by a pop up letting me know
that I'm typing while on a call.

------
akbaralis
End for Google Voice?

