Google Duo, a new video chat app that works exclusively on phones, is getting released today. I've been using it for about a week and I can tell you that it's fast, easy to use, and devoid of complicated bells and whistles. You tap on the face of the person you want to call, they answer, and you have a one-on-one video chat going. Nobody who uses this app can say that Google didn't achieve its goal of creating a video chat app that's relentlessly, explicitly designed solely for phones.
That effort is so single-minded I can't decide if it's timid or bold.
First, a bit about how Duo works. It's available on both Android phones and iPhones. When you sign up, the app checks your phone number from your SIM and then sends you a confirmation text. That's the whole setup process — there are no accounts to create nor friend lists to maintain. It's tied directly to your contacts list and your phone number.
That's great for simplicity, but bad if you want to use Duo on anything other than your phone. It's also unable to make conference calls, put Hangouts-style funny pirate hats on your head during a call, or offer just about any other fancy feature you might expect from a video conference app.
Duo's radical simplicity is by design, says vice president of Google's communications division, Nick Fox. "By being laser-focused on mobile," he says, "it enables us to just make sure that we were doing a great, wonderful job on that case. ... For us, we thought 'amazing on mobile, nothing on desktop' was the better approach."
There is one feature in Duo that feels genuinely new: it's called "Knock Knock." When you receive a call on Android (it doesn't work on the iPhone), your entire screen starts showing the live video from your caller before you even answer. It lets you see who's calling — and lets the caller make funny faces to try to entice you to answer. Google's promo video for Duo emphasizes it heavily:
In my testing, Knock Knock worked very well — and it has the added benefit of making the call start immediately. The video call is already running the nanosecond you swipe up to answer it. "Instead of the call starting with frustration and confusion," Fox says, "you start with a smile because you know it already works." I don't know about the smile, but I do know that Duo calls started without all the "Hello, are you there?" that I typically experience with most other video and audio calls.
For those worried about people hijacking their screen with a video feed while they're at dinner or a meeting, a few notes to ease your mind. First, Knock Knock only works with people you already have saved in your contacts — so random people won't show up. Second, you can block a caller if you like — but take note that since Duo doesn't have its own independent friends list, blocking a caller on Duo blocks them everywhere. Last, you can turn the feature off entirely if you don't like it.
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Google also has done a lot of work on the back end to make things feel immediate. It's based on WebRTC, with some added technical underpinnings to make the call automatically ratchet the quality up or down depending on your connection quality. It's even able to maintain the call when you switch from Wi-Fi to cellular. After a very brief hiccup, the call just keeps on going.
I mostly tested Duo on a Nexus 5X (running the latest Android Nougat Beta), where call quality was mostly good — better on Wi-Fi, but never so bad that it dropped completely. On the iPhone 6S, call quality was equally good. However, because Google doesn’t have the same ability to integrate on iOS as it does on Android, there are a few hassles: no Knock Knock, and you have to unlock the phone before you answer the call.
Duo is the second of the two apps Google announced at its developer conference this past May. The other is the AI-enhanced text messaging app Allo, for which Google hasn't yet announced a release date. That's odd enough, but perhaps not as confusing as Google's overall strategy with communication apps: instead of fixing its unified solution, Hangouts, Google has opted to release two different (but slightly related) messaging apps: one for video and one for text.
Neither app is designed to replace Google's other video and messaging app, Hangouts. Instead, Hangouts will continue to exist with a more tightly focused mission: serving enterprise users, where Fox says we can expect "it will increasingly be more integrated with Google Apps suite." It will still be available for consumers, of course, but those users won't be the focus of future product development.
And Fox is also not especially concerned that Google is offering a multiplicity of communication apps. He sees Google's products as split broadly into three bands: Allo and Duo for consumers; Hangouts for the enterprise; and services that are more carrier focused — like SMS, RCS, and even the Phone app. Fox believes that consumers simply aren't confused by a multiplicity of messaging apps — whether they're made by Google or not — "People use the apps that their friends are using," he says. And he's excited to see Duo (and, later, Allo) compete with all of them head-to-head.
How Duo will actually compete was (and is) one of my biggest questions. Why use Duo when Facebook Messenger, Snapchat, FaceTime, Hangouts, and any number of other options exist? Is Google going to leverage the massive power of the Android install base somehow? Will Duo be part of the standard suite of Google Play apps preinstalled on the vast majority of Android phones (outside of China)? "We haven't made decisions on that yet," says Fox. "We want to get it out there, see how it does, and then I see distribution as the next step rather than the first step."
When I said up top that I couldn't decide whether Google's strategy with Duo was bold or timid, this is what I was referring to. It's not going to be the automatic default for all Android phones, replacing phone calls in the way that iMessage replaces SMS. Google isn't ready to go there just yet, which feels timid.
But it's also bold. In this incredibly crowded marketplace, Google is forcing Duo to compete on its own merits. You can invite somebody to use it by sending them a text from inside the app, but otherwise the plan seems to just be to see how it is received in the marketplace. I asked some variant of "how are you going to get users for this thing" no fewer than four times in my hour with Fox, and every time the answer boiled down to this: "We're focused on building great apps that people love and distribution will follow that."
I have no idea if that plan will work: sometimes boldness is just naiveté. But I can't help but respect the clarity of purpose behind the creation of Duo. It's aggressively, obsessively focused on making the best possible mobile experience for video chat, at the expense of all else. He said no to desktop, no to conference calling, no even to allowing the same account to work on multiple devices. For the Duo team, getting "mobile first" right meant demanding it be "mobile only."
Duo does one-on-one video chat very well, which is what Google set out to make it do. The question now is whether or not that's enough.Google's new app, Duo, is a simple video-calling service that's available for Android and iOS today. Alongside the upcoming messaging app Allo, it's one of two communication apps Google announced earlier this year at its I/O conference, and one of four altogether from the company.
In a way, it's Google's answer to Apple's FaceTime, and it makes one-to-one calling between Android phones, and from Android to iPhone, very simple. Though both parties have to download the app to begin chatting (unlike FaceTime, which is baked into the dialer of compatible iPhones), it's still an intuitive app to use.
And while Android users will likely enjoy using Duo to video-call all their friends, iPhone owners won't find it compelling enough to ring up fellow iPhone users. However, it may certainly become their go-to app when calling up a buddy who uses Android. With that said, here are its main highlights:
You'll see previews with Knock Knock
Duo's unique feature is Knock Knock, which gives you a preview of who is calling by firing up the camera on the other end of the line. If you're initiating the call, you'll see a little notice that says your video is visible, which means the other person can see what you're doing right at that moment in real time. Android users can see Knock Knock regardless of whether Duo is opened or not (like on the lock screen). On the iPhone though, you'll only see it if you're in the app. Otherwise, you'll just get a little notification saying someone's calling you.
Google's rationale for this is that Knock Knock already gets you smiling before the call starts. Of course, that's assuming you actually like/want to speak to the other person who is on the other line. Seeing family members on the other line? That gets me smiling. Seeing the face of my boss? Mmm, not so much (see below). Editor's Note from said boss: "Hmph."
You can disable Knock Knock
Before you worry about seeing anything you don't want to see from the other line, know that you can only receive Knock Knocks from people who are already in your contact list. You can also block individual people from calling you. (By the way, when you block a person on Duo, the person won't know it. When they call, they'll just hear your line ring and ring continuously.)
If Knock Knock really isn't your thing, you can disable it altogether in Duo's Settings menu. You can't disable Knock Knock on a person-to-person basis though, so it's Knock Knock or nothing.
Its interface is super simple
Duo has an incredibly user-friendly and intuitive interface. Before you begin a call, you'll see icons to start a video call and your recent contacts (sorry, there's no audio-only option). During a call, you'll see yourself (in a small little circle), and icons to mute audio, switch cameras and hang up. Video from the other line fills up your screen and that's pretty much it. If you'd rather have your camera fill up the screen (for example, you're touring a house to the person on the other line), just tap the preview circle and your view will switch. Read more about getting started with Duo.
It's different than Hangouts (no, really)
At this point you might be wondering what makes Duo different than Google's other video-calling service, Hangouts, and you're not alone if you think the company has one too many communication tools. But according to Google, Duo is supposed to be way more specialized. Whereas Hangouts can be used on desktops, supports messaging and group chats, and has multiway video for collaboration (and its interface reflects these extra features), Duo does one thing and one thing only: video calls on your phone or tablet.
Unlike Hangouts, it reaches people through their phone numbers, not their Gmail. Other than downloading the app, you won't have to force anyone to log into their Google accounts or sign up for a new service. And the best difference between it and Hangouts? It uses end-to-end encryption, so your data can't be viewed from third parties or even Google itself.
It works only as well as your connection
Not surprisingly, if you have a good Wi-Fi or data connection, the app works smoothly. When I used it and had strong coverage, people looked clear and their voices were easy to understand. I experienced some lag from time to time, but it usually lasted just a few seconds.
When one of my colleagues was on a weaker Wi-Fi network, however, he was extremely pixelated. Though audio came in clear, his face just ended up looking like a study in 1880s pointillism. After he switched to a stronger Wi-Fi network, however, his image cleared up and our conversation was stable.
You might actually want to use it
There are loads of apps these days that either center around video chatting or have it as one of their features. Duo is coming into a crowded industry, competing not only against Skype, Facebook Messenger and others, but even Google itself with Hangouts.
All three of these competing apps do much more than simply one-to-one video calls. For example, they support messaging and you can start video calls with multiple people. Plus, with Messenger, you don't need a Facebook account (a phone number will suffice).
But Google didn't create Duo to be an all-in-one communication platform; to do so would make it hairier to use. Google also believes that when a person decides to video-call a friend, one rarely wants to pivot to messaging or group chatting anyway.
Because Duo offers just the bare bones, it can provide a solid, no-muss-no-fuss video calling service. This singular functionality frees you from having to sign in another account, make sure your buddy has the same service or take time to navigate through a busy interface. Plus, its end-to-end encryption means your conversations are protected from prying eyes. (As I mentioned before, Hangouts doesn't have that and Skype isn't secure either. Messenger has begun testing end-to-end user privacy, but hasn't rolled it out en masse.)
True, iPhone users will probably keep using FaceTime to communicate with one another, but Duo bridges the gap between iOS and Android. With its quirky Knock Knock feature, simplistic approach and data encryption, Duo makes it a whole lot easier to say hi and wave hello.
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