Google Chat to replace classic Hangouts as default chat app for more users

Beginning late 2021, remaining classic Hangouts customers will be migrated to "Chat Preferred," and classic Hangouts will no longer be supported and will be fully replaced with Chat.

Starting mid-August, organizations using the "Chat and classic Hangouts" service setting will be migrated to "Chat Preferred" by default, but Google Workspace administrators can opt-out of this migration, Google announced on Monday.

More specifically, as a Workspace admin, you have the option to:

• Opt-out of the migration to preserve your current settings
• Upgrade all of your users to “Chat preferred”

If you don't take any action before August 16, 2021, all users in your organization who have the “Chat and classic Hangouts” setting selected will be automatically upgraded to “Chat preferred” and the “Chat and classic Hangouts” setting will no longer be accessible.

All affected users will receive an email notification that contains more information and any necessary action that needs to be taken. However, if there are no users in your domain with the “Chat and classic Hangouts” service setting selected, no action is required.

Beginning late 2021, remaining classic Hangouts customers will be migrated to "Chat Preferred," and classic Hangouts will no longer be supported and will be fully replaced with Chat.

Unlike classic Hangouts, Google Chat doesn't support direct calling, but the feature is expected to become available later this year. Also, messages sent in classic Hangouts 1:1 and group conversations will be available in Chat, except for a few special cases.

The changes will impact all Google Workspace customers, as well as G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise customers.