Now You Can Make Free Telephone Calls Direct From Gmail

Google was coy about reports later today that users were discovering a “call phone” button in their Gmail accounts, but the company has just officialy confirme that over the next few days, they will be rolling the ability to call people directly on their phones is coming to Gmail, and that until at least the end of this year, the service will be available for calls to the U.S. and Canada.

Calls to other countries will be priced in accordance with this rate table. If you don’t presently have money in a Google account, you’ll need to add it by clicking on your credit balance and adding credit using Google Check-out.

If you’re curious in testing the function, you’ll first require to install Google’s 22 MB voice and video package from here, the phone icon will appear at the top of your chat list if it’s enabled for you. Click on that and you’ll be taken to a panel where you can punch in phone numbers. If you’re concerned in getting calls in Gmail, the setup is a little more involved: You’ll have to set up a Google Voice account, make at least one outgoing call from Gmail, and follow these instructions.

One final random tidbit: If you’re Canadian, you can use the new service by changing your Gmail settings to English – US.

Under, Google’s demonstration video:


Google Gmail

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