Who said Hangouts was dead? Why, it was just updated with support for one of Android 7.1 Nougat’s cool new features – app shortcuts! That’s right, joining the majority of Google’s own apps, and a few third-party efforts, Hangouts now lets you perform some quick actions by long-pressing its icon.
To take advantage of the new functionality, you will need to be on Android 7.1 or higher, and have Google Now or the latest beta version of Nova Launcher installed on your device, or Pixel Launcher if you are rocking a new Pixel phone.
You can now quickly start a new conversation, or a voice or video chat by simply long-pressing the Hangouts icon on your home screen or in the app drawer. Unfortunately, if you are using multiple accounts in Hangouts, the app shortcuts menu brings up the “Choose account” option every time, instead of the aforementioned quick actions.
App shortcuts support is being introduced in Hangouts version 14. If the update still hasn’t rolled out to you via the Play Store, you can download the latest version of the app below.
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