Read receipts on chats and emails can be both a boon and a bane, depending on how you feel about knowing whether someone has read your message already and may or may not have responded already. Last month, Google said they are bringing this feature to direct messages on Google Chat and now finally that day has come. The chat app was actually also just recently rebranded from Hangouts (even though Hangouts actually still exists) so we can expect more upcoming features soon.
The new feature is pretty simple and straightforward. You’ll be able to see when the person you’re chatting with has already seen your message. You’ll be able to see the avatar of the person that you’re chatting with on the right side of the last message that they’ve are lady seen. The read receipts will show up when the user is in the conversation and has already read the message or when they’ve replied to a message from a notification.
However, read receipts will only show up for one-on-one conversations and not for group messages or rooms but eventually, it will probably show up there as well. The previous incarnation of Chats, Hangouts, already had read receipts as well. Google has actually been adding features from previous versions of their apps to the newer versions so Google Chat is now almost at feature parity with Hangouts.
Read receipts will be available for all Google Workspace users including Essentials, Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education, Enterprise for Education, and Nonprofits customers. Okay that’s a lot of different kinds of customers so you’ll probably fall into one of those categories.
Google has long had a messaging problem with various incarnations over the years including Hangouts, Allo, etc. For a tech giant, their communications products can be such a mess. Let’s see if Chats will be it or just another stop in their quest to have a better chat and messaging app.
