The “classic” version of Google Hangouts is back surprisingly on the App Store, although with certain limitations – formally it is not listed, so to download it is not enough to search for it and it is not even suggested by the platform’s automatic algorithms. You need to have the direct link. We provide it to you at the end of the article, although we doubt that it will actually serve you anything.
Unlisted apps are useful more than anything else for developers and the companies that produce them: in this way, they can share them among employees for the most disparate reasons without the need to have (example) an actively shared cloud storage or other ancillary services.
Technically even this version of the app still works: in fact, the platform’s servers are still online, for example for those who have the app pre-installed or in any case had installed and activated it before its disappearance. That said, Google decided to abandon it precisely because no one used it, so at this point it is more a curiosity than an actual useful report.
As we know, Google’s adventure in the world of instant messaging has been troubled and complicated, to put it mildly. Summarizing briefly, we can say that the Mountain View giant has tried its luck with a large number of services and strategies over the years, but none have really been successful. And to think that at the time it was rumored that it was in the running to grab WhatsApp, but that it pulled back in front of the huge amount put into play by Facebook (Google later denied but not everyone was completely convinced).
However, the current situation is that at the moment Google is pushing on the one hand on Messages, trying to bring SMS back into vogue through their current evolution, namely the RCS protocol, and on the other on Chat, which until some time ago was called Hangouts Chat and was aimed mostly at the world of work. That’s where Google is hijacking users of the old Hangouts, waiting to pull the plug permanently – when, however, we still don’t know.
- Google Hangouts | iOS | Apple App Store, Free