“Over 1,000,000 calls placed from Gmail in just 24 hours!” Google tweeted triumphantly Thursday about its new Gmail phone calling service.
“We’re calling it ‘Call Phones in Gmail’,” a Google spokesperson told the Daily News. The new Call Phones in Gmail service allows users to call real landline and mobile phones directly from their Gmail account if they have a microphone and speakers.
Google already provides computer-to-computer voice and video chat functions within Gmail, as well as an existing Google Voice system which functions outside of Gmail.
“It’s not entirely Google Voice because you don’t actually need a Google Voice account to place outbound calls – only if you want to receive inbound calls,” the spokesperson told the Daily News. Call Phones in Gmail can, however, display Google Voice numbers as the outbound caller ID, according to the official Gmail blog.
Call Phones in Gmail’s pricing plan may concern Internet calling competitors such as Skype. According to the official Gmail blog, there will be no charge for calls made to the U.S. and Canada through the rest of 2010. International call fees range from $0.02 per minute (for calls to landlines in a number of countries, including Russia, Argentina, Australia and the United Kingdom) to $6.90 a minute (if you plan to call someone who uses mobile service provider Inmarsat). For Americans who want to use Call Phones in Gmail to reach friends and relatives stationed in Iraq, calls to landlines will cost $0.09 per minute and calls to mobile devices will cost $0.16 per minute.
While many people will likely find Call Phones in Gmail a convenient option for Internet voice communications, don’t plan on using it to call 911. Google advises that its voice services cannot handle emergency service calls.
