What you need to know
- Google Chrome 116 stable update version gets rid of "click-to-call," sparking user unrest.
- Vocal users took to the Chromium forum to voice their displeasure and gaining the gaze of a Google employee who offered a glimmer of hope.
- Click-to-call let users click on a phone number on their PC and have the call dialed on their connected Android phone without any manual input.
Google appears to have gotten rid of quite a useful feature in Chrome with its latest update — and users are in an uproar.
The company's latest decision involves Chrome's click-to-call feature, as ArtemR on X calls attention to its abrupt disappearance (via Android Police). The feature's flag, chrome://flags/#click-to-call, is non-existent as Google looks to supposedly do away with it due to "low usage."
Diving into Chrome and trying to re-enable the flag has proved fruitless as there's no way to do so.
I've been wondering where click to call has disappeared off to in my Chrome. Turns out @ChromiumDev @googlechrome @google want to kill it due to "low usage."Boooooooooooooo! It's such a useful feature. Don't remove it, Google! https://t.co/VT2J3uOLStAugust 30, 2023
Google Chrome's click-to-call feature was quite a useful one, considering users could find a number online and direct it to their connected Android device. Clicking on a phone number in Chrome would open a floating window so users could choose which device they'd like to dial on. This feature removed the ability to need to manually unlock a phone and type in the numbers — it was seamless.
Users have taken to the Chromium forum to voice their displeasure with Google's latest decision. In a lengthy "Bring click-to-call back," users have cited how useful the feature was in their day-to-day lives and how one user would utilize the function over a hundred times a day with their co-workers.
Fortunately, the voices of the many have struck a chord with Google as an employee responded in an attempt to offer some hope. The Googler stated, "I'll have a conversation with our product team about whether we can continue to support the feature" before cutting off any further comments to the thread.
In the meantime, those with access to the forum can "star" it to continue to express interest in the feature's return.
And while it's not the same, Google was spotted working on a "Link Your Devices" feature for Android 14. It would give users the option to start a call on one device and swap it to another without dropping the call and requiring a re-dial. This is a feature Android users may find helpful. However, it's nothing new for Apple's iOS folks as they've had Continuity for a while now.
