Google Voice App Receives First Update in Five Years

A new version has rolled out updating the Google Voice app for Android, iOS and web plugin, breaking a five year update drought which is unprecedented among Google’s stable of apps. With over 3.5 million users, Google Voice is far from dead although why Google chose to ignore it for so long remains a mystery. They are however promising to provide new updates and features moving forward in a recent blog post. The downside is that it is not available in some locations depending on telecommunications laws, for example as I type this and try to download it while in Canada, the Play Store message indicates that it is not available in my region.

Google Voice bought the service in 2007 and was officially released as a Google product two years later in 2009. The idea behind it is simple: to have one phone number for everything and for life. The phone number is tied to the person rather than to a device or location. This allows users who signed up to use Google Voice to get calls, text and voicemail synced on all their devices. It is also completely without ads plus it is completely free with no initial or monthly payments required. Obviously this does not sit will with those who stand to make billions by offering these services for a fee so naturally, it is not available as a service everywhere.

The new update refreshes the layout on all platforms and the interface is also a lot cleaner. The update should also fix many of the issues that users have using the web version. The messaging application has now been updated to include support for group and photo MMS, as well as in-notification replies. Google has also added voicemail transcription, initially for Spanish with improvements and additional ones to be added over time.