Google replaces Hangouts with Duo in stock Android applications

Google has informed partners in an email that it will no longer include the Hangouts chat app as standard in the Google Mobile Services package from December. The app’s replacement will be the recently released video chat service Duo.

The Android Police site has published part of the email. In it, the search giant writes that from December it will be ‘optional to add Hangouts to telephony products’. This makes it clear that manufacturers can still deliver the app on their devices. In the cases where this does not happen, users can download the Hangouts app from the Play Store.

Duo, the service to replace Hangouts, was released by Google in August. The app allows users to have a video call with each other. This conversation is secured by end-to-end encryption. The announcement of Duo was accompanied by that of the chat app Allo, which became available at the end of September.

Google has long added few new features to Hangouts since its introduction in 2013. The service was created by merging a number of existing Google chat services.