Google Meet Vs Google Duo – The Merger

Image Courtesy: Android Central

Since Covid-19, video calling/virtual meeting app usage has exploded beyond anyone’s expectation. Every meeting has gone virtual - board meetings, strategy meetings, shows, interviews, negotiations, etc. 

People have closed deals worth millions of dollars using virtual meeting apps. Google was not left out of the party as they received their patronage via their messaging apps like Google Duo, Google Meet, and the like.

Google Duo and Google Meet, two of Google's hottest apps, are in the news today for a reason. The search giant engine giant is merging the two apps! The news has been around for a while, but the news was confirmed on Google's blog on Wednesday. Like every other good thing which must end, Google decided to axe one of the apps and collapsed it into the other.

In Google’s official statement, they explained that they want to create a “single video communication service.” The merger would favour Google Meet as it would subsume Duo. However, all is not lost for Duo. Its codebase would live on as the basis for the new Google Meet. The feature for video calling from the Duo platform would remain, and Google would add Meet features to the Duo app. According to Google, it will be a win-win situation as they said all features from both apps would make it to the new app.

Google Meet was launched in 2017 to compete with Zoom in the business video meeting department. However, the patronage of Zoom took an all-time rocket high in 2019/2020 during the wake of Covid-19. The company's assets have since exploded and, as of this year, hit above 500 million downloads and business customers of 504,900. Google Meet is not doing badly either; it has 500 million+ downloads on Google Play. The merger with Duo is a strategic move as Google is targeting to compete with Zoom using the platform of Duo, which has a juicy total download of well over 5 billion!

Google Duo, for your information, came into being in 2016 as a standalone app for video chatting and was accompanied by Google Allo, a WhatsApp clone. Google Allo was developed after the failure of Google to acquire WhatsApp as Facebook edged them out. In a bid to rival WhatsApp, Allo was born – a pure clone of the former. However, Allo failed to compete as users preferred WhatsApp. Originally, Duo was made as a one-on-one video chat app but to compete favourably during the pandemic; the app was upgraded and now can support 32 people in a video chat. Duo's total download on Google Play stands as five billion+ today.

Once the app is available to users, users can easily schedule a video meeting at such a time that anyone can join. Users can also continue using video calling to connect with a person or group rapidly. The app would eventually carry the name Google Meet. It will be available to everyone on the search engine giant’s platform. Once all the changes have been made, Meet users would switch apps to the new Meet.

According to Google, users will not experience any service disruption after the switch. They stressed that all Duo and Meet features would make it to the new app to make that possible. They were emphatic about that statement and backed the claim up on their blog.

We are watching to see how these would pan out and shall bring you details as soon as they are available.

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