Google to shut down Hangouts later this year

Back in February, Google replaced the Hangouts app for Workspace users with the newer ‘Google Chat’. The company is now set to completely shut down the older Hangouts later this year, moving all current users of the platform to Google Chat.
Google revealed in a new blog post that Hangouts will be taken down in November 2022, and users on desktop and mobile will be asked to migrate to Google Chat before that. Chat data from the Hangouts platform will automatically be available on Google Chat, and users will also have the option to download all their Hangouts data before the platform is axed.
“Starting today, people using Hangouts on mobile will see an in-app screen asking them to move to Chat in Gmail or the Chat app. Similarly, people who use the Hangouts Chrome extension will be asked to move to Chat on the web or install the Chat web app. In July, people who use Hangouts in Gmail on the web will be upgraded to Chat in Gmail,” Google said in the post.

Google also mentioned that Hangouts users will still see an in-product notice at least a month before Hangouts web is taken down. After this, Hangouts web will begin automatically redirecting visitors to Google Chat web.
Hangouts was introduced back in 2013, and was the planned successor to GChat (not to be confuse with the newer Google Chat). GChat, or as some people know it, Google Talk, was shut down earlier this month, and after Hangouts suffers a similar fate later this year, it seems Google Chat will be Google’s latest attempt at bringing a seamlessly integrated instant messaging service across devices.