Best android video chat app??

valve90210 · 11 Oct 2016 at 09:47

Hi All

I'm looking for a good reliable video chat app for use when my ex and little boy move away so I can easily stay in touch with him.

I will use either my S5 or my Nexus 7 2013, he will be using his nexus 7 2013.

I tried Skype this morning, set up accounts on my phone and his tablet and gave it a quick whirl and have to say I was not impressed, the video quality was awful and there was huge lag on it, literally 10 seconds or more and very stuttery... completely unusable and that was with both devices on wifi in my home, I dread to think what it'd be like when my little boy is else where.

Can anyone recommend any apps you have experience with that might work better?

Father Ted · 11 Oct 2016 at 09:58

Google Duo, nice and simple, works really well. Available for Androis & IOS.

Kainz · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:10

I found Skype dreadful to use for any length of time when I tried it last year, I had way too many drops. I tried Viber for a while and that was ok. Google Duo beats the lot of them though - it's their new app and is very simple to use. So far video quality has been top notch.

valve90210 · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:13

I shall check that out.

Can you sign into it from a different google account to the one the tablet is linked to? My boy's tablet is on his mum's account so she manages his apps etc but I'd like the video chat to be linked to his own email address so the only contacts will be his ones which will just be me.

Father Ted · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:26

Actually scratch that. Duo won't work on a tablet as it tied to a phone number so no use in that scenario I'm afraid.

valve90210 · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:27

damn....lol

Orcvader · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:36

Hangouts? Just had a look and it allows you to add another Google account.

valve90210 · 11 Oct 2016 at 10:41

I might give that a try, although from having used it in the past it's not greatly better than Skype..

Any other options people have tried and found to be good, like imo or viber or anything?

valve90210 · 12 Oct 2016 at 09:12

Last night I gave hangouts a try, added my little boy's account to it and removed my ex's from hangout. annoyingly it still picks up all the contacts from both accounts but I might be able to sort that out. However, it doesn't receive any messages I send, and when I try to send a message from the tablet it gets stuck on with a popup box saying "looking up contact", so sadly that doesn't work.

However this morning I tried putting Duo onto the tablet and linking it up to my ex's phone number and that worked fine, only problem at present will be if she wants to start using Duo on her phone as that will then unlink the tablet as, apparently, at the moment it can only be linked on one device.

Orcvader · 12 Oct 2016 at 12:31

Why not create a second account on the Nexus 7? That way everything will be only related to his account instead of your ex. And it's very easy to switch between accounts.

Can also add parental controls over it: http://www.howtogeek.com/205301/how...ed-user-profiles-for-basic-parental-controls/

valve90210 · 12 Oct 2016 at 13:53

That's how his old tablet was set up but my ex found it too confusing and annoying (I've no idea why) when she had to install games then set them up to be allowed on his profile. That's how I let him use tablet and it works well.

That said, a lot of google apps (including hangouts) don't work with restricted profiles so I'm not sure Duo would work either.