Hangouts vs Mumble

Start chatting on your phone, then on your computer, then on your tablet seamlessly!

Hangouts uses Google account credentials. If you use any other Google service, then you already have an account set up.

If you have signed in your Google account, Hangouts allows making video calls with up to 10 people or one-on-one. There are business, education and government solutions that increase the participant count to for video calls to 15 as well as offers support for those accounts.

Additionally, you can switch between using either the front-facing or rear-facing camera on your phone or tablet.

Google offers all features of Hangouts completely free on iOS, Android and web with quick and reliable sync across all platforms. It's also tightly integrated in other Google services - it can be accessed from services such as Gmail, Google+, Chrome.

While the standard Hangouts offering is completely free, there are business, education and government solutions that increase the participant count to for video calls to 15 and offers support that may cost money.

Use the extension on any computer you can run Chrome browser to text from your computer or tablet!

It's possible to know what each and every participant of the group has read. Their icons are displayed below the last message.

If you have gifs in your mobile phone, you can share them in the conversation and your partner will be able to see it animated in the chat.

Google Voice is a service that enables making and receiving free phone calls within US. Google Voice forwards incoming calls to all connected devices and allows placing calls from any of the connected devices, but they will show as coming from the Google Voice number.

Hangouts completely integrates Google Voice, allowing you to place calls and receive texts and voicemail from all of your devices. The Hangouts app for Android also includes a needed dialer for making calls with the users Google Voice number.

Hangouts app for Android can be extended with an optional dialer for making calls. Most calls to US and Canada are free and international calls have cheap rates.

A Google Voice account will be needed in order have a number that allows these calls to be made.

Hangouts can inform about the status of other users including what device they are currently using, whether they are in the middle of a call and when were they last seen. This allows making sure that you're not disturbing someone when initiating a conversation. It's possible to granularly turn off status sharing.

Hangouts can add different effects and overlays to video calls that can be viewed on your device. Unfortunately, they can't be set from your phone.

Hangouts can be used completely hands free, even if the app is not open and the phone is locked: "OK Google, send a Hangouts message to Mary".

Mumble is available as a free download and source code is available on GitHub.

The server software Murmur is licensed under a free and open-source BSD-style license.

Available on Windows, Linux, OS X, Android and iOS which allows for the user to choose what operating system works for them and still be able to use Mumble.

Since version 1.2.4, Mumble uses an audio codec named Opus that's specifically developed to provide low-latency voice communication over Internet. This means that there is no delay time, while audio still comes out clear.

Dedicated servers and low overhead allows Mumble to have the least delay between users speaking and others hearing their speech, which can be very important for fast paced games.

A push-to-talk key allows you to only transmit audio when you want it. Others won't hear you chewing or your mom entering the room unless you want to.

Mumble is completely free, even hosting your own server.

Mumble uses certificates for user identification. A certificate can be generated by the user himself or issued by a third-party organization with organization certificates having 2 classes. A self-generated certificate is not tied to anything, a Class 1 certificate is tied to an e-mail address and a Class 2 certificate requires proof of identity. Depending on the server a different level of certification might be required.

Mumble server side is easy to setup and works smooth even on Raspberry Pi, which is pretty short on resources.

An in-game overlay can be enabled to show users in the channel or users talking. Overlay can be disabled completely or on a per-game basis by going to Settings->Overlay. This allows for users to see their chat but not obstruct the game they are playing.

By default, only users in the same channel can hear each other. Channels can be nested to better organize yourself according to what you want to be talking about.

This encryption is mandatory and cannot be disabled. The so-called control channel, which transports your chat messages and other non-time critical information, is encrypted with TLS using 256 bit AES-SHA. The voice channel carrying speech and positional audio is encrypted with OCB-AES 128 bit.

Mumble includes great automatic volume adjustment functionality that can be used to prevent big volume changes while still allowing good communication.

Mumble supports positional audio for over 50 games, including versions of Call of Duty, Battlefield and Counter-Strike. This allows you to hear the audio from the direction of the player speaking, making gameplay more immersive and giving competitive players an edge. You can find a full list of supported games here.

Version 1.3 introduced skins, allowing you to customize your UI, either on your own (tutorial here) or by using one of the skins found here.