When comparing Google Hangouts vs MightyText, the Slant community recommends MightyText for most people. In the question“What are the best SMS apps for Android?” MightyText is ranked 6th while Google Hangouts is ranked 17th. The most important reason people chose MightyText is:
MightyText syncs your SMS between your phone, tablet and the web interface. This means you can now read and send SMS from whatever device is most convenient at the time.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Mobile support
Hangouts offers both an Android and iOS app so users can participate from nearly any mobile device in addition to his Desktop.
Pro Screen sharing
Any user can share his screen (or only a specific desktop or window) while still continuing an audio conversation.
Pro Free group video support
Hangouts works with up to 10 participants using video out of the box or up to 15 if you are a business, government or school. It determines who is the primary speaker at any given time, and the camera view automatically switches to that user.
Pro Useful for businesses
Hangouts can scale to become a videoconferencing solution for an entire company, since the software can run on nearly all platforms. In fact, Google itself uses Hangouts as its meeting room video conference software.
Pro Easy to start using
Hangouts is integrated with Gmail & Google+, does not require you to download desktop software, and all chats can take place directly in your browser, significantly reducing the barrier to entry for a new user.
Pro Completely free
Google offers all features of Hangouts completely free. There are business, education and government solutions that increase the participant count to for video calls to 15 and offers support.
Pro Cross platform
Hangouts work on Android, iOS, Chrome OS, web and as a Chrome extension.
Pro Live broadcasting and instant recording
With Google+ “Hangouts on Air”, you can broadcast any hangout to an unlimited audience via your Goolge+ Profile or simply a generic YouTube link. Moreover, any Hangout on Air (public or private) is automatically saved as YouTube video that you can keep for private reference or use in any way that you would normally share a YouTube video. This allows you to record conversations without additional obtrusive software.
Pro Google Voice integration
Allows for a fixed phone number, receiving and making calls. Calling US or Canada is free.
Pro Integrates with Google Maps for sharing locations
When chatting with people while trying to plan a meet up, the share map button can be extremely useful.
Pro Android app does both sms and hangouts messaging
Pro Read and send texts from all your Android devices + Web
MightyText syncs your SMS between your phone, tablet and the web interface. This means you can now read and send SMS from whatever device is most convenient at the time.
Pro Easy to get going as it uses your current phone number & SMS
MightyText uses SMS, so the people you message don't need to download the app in order for you to message them. This makes the transition from plain SMS to MightyText very easy and unlike Google Voice you keep your existing number.
Pro Great Gmail plugin
The gtext Gmail Plugin lets you both manage and send texts from within gmail. Texts are labeled and searchable within gmail and you can message contacts just like its a Gchat.
Pro Desktop/Tablet UI optimised for making texting faster
MightyText has a special view on their desktop and Tablets that make participating in multiple conversations simultaneously very easy.
Pro Gives useful desktop notifications from your phone
MightyText gives you desktop notifications for new texts and calls with the ability to quickly reply from your computer. There is also a really cool feature that shows you your current battery life on your phone as well as low battery alerts no matter where your phone is.
Pro Easy sharing of photos & videos from phone
Using the toggle to turn on the photo and video sharing feature allows for sharing of both file types easily.
Pro Instant sync & easy sharing of photos & videos from phone
Photos and videos can be sync'd from ones PC to phone as well as easily shared through ones phone. This makes for a convenient way to access all of ones photos/videos in order to always have the accessable to be sent in messages.
Pro Easily send group messages
Users can add multiple contacts to a group message that gets sent to all recipients at once when sent, which is great for times when a user is trying to coincide info with a bunch of people such as a group going out for the evening or work related exercises.
Pro Match the rest of ones device with themes
Users can theme MightyText to their liking, making a more customized looking app that can fit with other themed UI elements of the OS.
Pro Easily schedule messages
Users can set up schedules for their messages for when they want one to go out but know they won't be close to their phone or just want to have a particular time to send something without having to do it at that specific time.
Pro Text directly from Facebook
Using a Chrome extension users can send texts directly from within Facebook on ones desktop.
Cons
Con Poor video call quality
Only goes up to 720p30 + low bitrate.
Con Owned by Google
Con Lacking clients for older versions
Con High hardware usage
Con Not recommended for long sessions
Con Won't work on Windows 8-style UI
As Hangouts uses a browser plugin on the desktop and it doesn't work with Windows 8-style UI, it has to be used in desktop mode.
Con Uses SMS for all messages
MightyText does not support data messages, so you will still be billed as per your carrier rates for every SMS you send.