alloIt was reported earlier that according to 9to5Google’s sources, Google could be looking to shut Allo down. Unlike the confusion with the state of Hangouts, it seems that the rumors were right on the money this time as Google has since confirmed that they will be shutting Allo down come 2019.According to Google’s announcement, “Allo will continue to work through March 2019 and until then, you’ll be able to export all of your existing conversation history from the app—here are instructions on how to do so. We’ve learned a lot from Allo, particularly what’s possible when you incorporate machine learning features, like the Google Assistant, into messaging.”
Google also detailed their plans for Hangouts where they reiterate that at some point in the future, regular users will soon be able to use Hangouts Chat and Meet. “Hangouts Chat and Meet are primarily focused on team collaboration for G Suite customers and at some point will be made available for existing Hangouts users, too. We’re fully committed to supporting Hangouts users in the meantime.”
It is a pity that Allo was such a short-lived project, but its eventual shut down did not come as a surprise as Google had paused their work on it earlier this year, and with Google focusing on Android Messages and RCS, we suppose it was only a matter of time.