Facebook on Thursday announced it is finally rolling out 'Messenger Rooms' on mobile and desktop. Messenger Rooms will be challenging Industry leader Zoom and others like Google Meet and Skype.
With Messenger Rooms, you can host free video calls with up to 50 people with no time limit. Just like on Zoom, once you create a Room you can share links to invite anyone to join, even if they don’t have a Facebook account.
Messenger Rooms is available in the main facebook and messenger apps and also on desktop.
Here is part of CEO Mark Zuckerberg's post announcing the service:
"With so many people at home around the world, we're all relying on video chat to feel present with the people we care about. WhatsApp and Messenger are already the most popular video calling services globally, but for large groups most of the video services out there are designed for work, not social interactions. Messenger Rooms is group video chat designed for social interactions. Rooms have no time limits, can host up to 50 people, and you can create them for free across Messenger, Facebook, and soon Instagram and WhatsApp as well.
You can create a private room and invite a few friends with a link, or you can create a room for one of your groups, or for an event you're planning. You can also start a room for all your friends at the top of your News Feed and just see who stops by to say hi. You don't need to schedule time to hang out like other video conferencing tools -- it's much more serendipitous and fun. I've really enjoyed using it as we've been building it. I've gotten to catch up with a lot of people I miss seeing around but wouldn't have necessarily called on my own. Try it out and I'm interested to see what you think!"
According to Stan Chudnovsky, VP of Messenger, "Facebook users globally can create a room from Messenger, and users in North America can create a room from Facebook. We’re also starting to rollout the ability to host up to 50 people in a room globally."
Video chat on Messenger Rooms is not end-to-end encrypted like on whatsapp.
Zoom recently exploded in popularity drawing scrutiny and criticisms over privacy rights, after incidents of 'zoombombing,' and revelations that it routed its signal through China.