Google Talk will no longer be supported on June 16 — Google is urging you to switch to Chat
Google is finally closing its next service. This time, they decided to launch the Google Talk instant messaging service (also known as GChat).
Although Google moved Talk users to Hangouts in 2017 (another of its messaging platforms), the service was still available to third-party XMPP clients such as Pidgin and Gajim. But on June 16, the company will completely stop supporting the service.
Google’s support page indicates that it is ‘closing Google Talk’ and will no longer support third-party applications, citing its initial statement from 2017. Users who try to sign in to GChat after June 16 will see an authorization error message.
Google Talk was launched in 2005 as a way for users to send instant messages directly through Gmail. It later featured voice and video calls, as well as group chats. Google shut down Google Talk in 2017 and moved users to Hangouts. But later, the company decided to transfer users from Hangouts to Meet. Hangouts can still be used by owners of free Google Accounts, but they are shown a ‘Hangouts Coming Soon’ warning offering to switch to Google Chat.
Google encourages people who have accessed Google Talk through other apps to switch to Google Chat.
