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WCHS Insight

The Student News Site of West Covina High School

WCHS Insight

The Student News Site of West Covina High School

WCHS Insight

Google Duo Replacing FaceTime

This is the app icon for the iPhone 6. Google Duo is free on the App Store on any mobile device or computer. Photo by Cody Torres

BY CODY TORRES

Many people use FaceTime on their phone or computer. There are those days when you can not FaceTime your friend via phone or computer because they do not have the same brand as you.

Recently, Google has released a new app that lets people FaceTime with their friends. Unlike Apple’s FaceTime, Google Duo allows you to FaceTime your friend without needing the same brand of phone or computer as them. This can really help someone if they have a Samsung Galaxy S6 while their friend has an iPhone 7.

Google Duo can be downloaded through the app store on any device. Luckily, Google Duo is a free app that has no ads. Google Duo has a FaceTime feature that allows it to connect to FaceTime users. Users can also disable video to only use voice audio if they want.

Google Duo is extremely easy to set up. All you need to do is put your phone number into the app and you will receive a code that will allow you to access the calling features.

Unless you have a very strong WiFi connection, your call will be blurry. Expect patches to this effect in the near future. Photo by Cody Torres

On the other hand, a downside of Google Duo is the audio. The audio is fair, but for me, I heard a lot of background noises. This became intimidating quickly. Duo also needs a strong connection from your WiFi to be clear. If you don’t have a strong connection, FaceTiming a friend may be in low quality. If you resort to data, your data will be used quickly, thus draining your data unless you are fortunate enough to have an unlimited plan. For the most part, Google Duo is a helpful app with very minor problems.

Overall, this is a great app that can be very useful. There may be a few problems here and there, but it can most likely be fixed. Since Google Duo is a new app, it is constantly being fixed for bugs and glitches. This app is gaining more popularity each day, and I recommend anyone looking for a direct improvement to FaceTime to download it.  

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  • A

    Aggah mosezJan 13, 2021 at 5:48 am

    English

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  • F

    FerrisSep 27, 2020 at 8:32 pm

    I like to use duo as a source of communication

    Reply