Chat service consolidation

To ease the transition to Google Chat, the chat services and settings for classic Hangouts and Google Chat have been combined in the Admin console. 

Chat service status control

You can choose which chat services to turn on for your organization, as well as decide whether Google Chat should be included in Gmail, by navigating to AppsGoogle WorkspaceSettings for Google Chat and classic HangoutsService Status and choosing one of the settings below. You can apply these settings to your entire organization or to specific organizational units.

Service status*	Chat Clients				Classic Hangouts Clients
	Gmail	Web	Desktop (PWA)	Mobile	Gmail	Web	Chrome extension	Mobile
Chat preferred	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No
Chat only	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
Chat and classic Hangouts*	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Classic Hangouts only*	No	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Both turned off	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No

*You might not see every service option. Classic Hangouts will be upgraded to Google Chat starting March 22, 2022. 

For more information about the service options, including availability information and important differences between "Chat preferred" and "Chat only," refer to Choose a chat service for your organization.

Chat settings

All Google Chat and classic Hangouts settings can be found on the “Google Chat and classic Hangouts” setting page. Unless specified, these settings apply to both classic Hangouts and Google Chat.” For more information, see Google Chat and classic Hangouts settings.