

Indeed, we dare say that many casual Facebook users probably don’t even know this is a possibility.Īll in all, video calling on Facebook feels like a nice bonus option rather than a front-and-centre service. Like the mobile app, this isn’t really Facebook’s area of focus. You can initiate video calls through here too, by clicking on a contact in the side bar and hitting the little camera icon. Put simply, we wouldn’t use this as our first-choice video-calling app, but if you’re heavily invested in Facebook (and there’s a good chance that you are) it’s a nice option to have.įacebook, of course, is mainly accessed through a desktop web browser. Instead, you have to navigate to the contacts tab, or go into the individual contact and select the phone icon. Indeed, the ability to initiate a direct video call isn’t immediately apparent – there’s no shortcut from the timeline menu. These messages can involve text, photos, and brief video clips, and they’re all sent using Facebook’s familiar circular profile pictures. But is it a fair reflection of the software?įacebook Messenger is focused on sending instant messages above video calls. This negative feedback would appear to be from a vocal minority that feel like Facebook has strong-armed them into using the app. Facebook Messengerįacebook’s transition to a dedicated messaging app has not been a smooth one – as the Facebook Messenger iPhone app’s average 1.5 out of 5 rating will attest to. It’s worth noting that video call quality is uniformly strong across the board here, to the point where it’s more dependent on the quality of your connection and your proximity to it than any great differences in software.Īs such, this is more a look at the interface and approach to video calling from each service. We thought now would be a good time to take a look at five of the top video calling services out there and find out which is the best for you.

In recent years, video calling has gone from being a slightly finicky desktop-bound activity, essentially used as a long-distance phone call replacement, to a viable means of talking to anyone face-to-face wherever we are.Īdvances in smartphone and network technology have played a large part in this, of course, but another factor is the proliferation of high quality video calling software. Facebook Messenger vs Google Hangouts vs Viber vs Skype vs FaceTime
