Google Chat

Google Chat is the company's enterprise messaging platform and the designated successor to Google Hangouts, which Google retired in 2022. Built specifically for Google Workspace environments, Chat provides direct messaging, group conversations in persistent Spaces, file sharing via Google Drive, and one-click escalation to Google Meet video calls — all within a single interface. For organizations already operating in the Google Workspace ecosystem (Gmail, Drive, Docs, Calendar), Chat is the connective tissue that ties those tools into a coherent collaboration platform. The app is clean and functional. The Spaces feature is its most distinctive element: unlike Slack channels or Teams channels that exist purely as text feeds, Google Spaces incorporate threaded conversations, task lists, and shared file storage into a unified project hub. A Space for a marketing campaign, for instance, can hold the team's Drive files, a shared task list, and the ongoing conversation thread without requiring separate tools. In-line previews of Google Docs and Sheets let participants comment and edit without leaving Chat, and the transition to a Meet video call takes a single tap from any conversation window. The limitations become apparent outside Workspace. Google Chat has no meaningful presence among personal users or businesses not on Workspace, which creates a network effect problem: it is an excellent internal tool that becomes useless the moment you need to collaborate with a client or partner who uses Slack or Teams. The third-party integration directory — while growing — remains far behind Slack's app ecosystem. Google's history of abandoning messaging products (Allo, Hangouts, Google+, Duo in its original form) also creates a reasonable concern about Chat's long-term roadmap, even though it appears more structurally committed than its predecessors.

Features

• →Spaces — Persistent project hubs combining threaded conversation, shared task lists, and Drive file storage in one place.
• →Meet Integration — One-tap escalation from any Chat conversation to a Google Meet video call with the same participants.
• →Drive File Sharing — Google Drive files shared in Chat open as inline previews with live commenting and editing without leaving the app.
• →Workspace Native — Included free with all Workspace tiers and personal Google accounts, with no additional licensing required.

Final take

Google Chat is an excellent messaging layer for Workspace-committed organizations, with Spaces and Meet integration that genuinely improve team collaboration. Outside the Google ecosystem, its limited network effect and thin third-party integrations make it a hard recommendation over Slack or Microsoft Teams.