Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Skype Video Calling Coming to iPhone?

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
64,921
33,071


Popular VoIP service Skype has had an iPhone application since early 2009, but the company has yet to roll out video calling for the iPhone or other mobile platforms.


144251-skype_iphone_video_calling.jpg


But as noted by Engadget, a number of clues are lining up to suggest that the company will announce video calling support for the iPhone and iPod touch at CES 2011 early next month.
Skype has been telling everyone that it'll be making a "series of video-related announcements" at CES next month... and it's participating in a panel called "Video Calling Gets Ready for Primetime," so yeah, needless to say, we'd have to guess that Skype's finally getting ready to enter the mobile video calling game in a big way. Anyhow, the final piece in the puzzle filtered into our inbox this morning: a help document on Skype's site detailing making video calls using Skype for iPhone.
Click to expand...
The help document, available through the online help portion of the Skype iPhone application, curiously notes that users of a number of iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad models can use video calling despite the fact that not all of these devices are camera-enabled.
To make video calls with your contacts, you will need an iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, 3rd generation iPod touch, 4th generation iPod touch or an iPad. Your contacts will only be able to see you if your device has a camera. Make sure your device is running iOS 4.0 or above and that you are using Skype for iPhone 3.0 or above.
Click to expand...
While the help document notes that Skype for iPhone 3.0 is required for video calling, the current version of Skype for iPhone is only 2.1.2.

Article Link: Skype Video Calling Coming to iPhone?
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2010/12/24/skype-video-calling-coming-to-iphone/
nagromme

nagromme

macrumors G5
May 2, 2002
12,546
1,196
Sounds good. I just hope Skype starts using Push properly so that you can be “available” on Skype without the app sucking battery in the background. (If Skype really does that the way it seems to, I don’t know how Apple even allows it.)

I like the idea of enabling one-way video calls to people who don’t have a camera. Sometimes you just want to show someone something, and 2-way doesn’t really matter.

vincenz said:
If it works over 3G, then it'll be news.
Click to expand...

Bigger news: when something replaces 3G (and I don’t mean early marketing-hype 4G) that widely and consistently offers sufficient bandwidth and quality to make video calls work well! It will happen.
 
HLdan

HLdan

macrumors 603
Aug 22, 2007
6,383
0
Yeah, they are spending time working on this crap when they need to focus on fixing Skype 5.0 for Mac. :rolleyes:
 
Y

YoGramMamma

macrumors regular
Feb 20, 2006
110
0
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

nagromme said:
Sounds good. I just hope Skype starts using Push properly so that you can be “available” on Skype without the app sucking battery in the background. (If Skype really does that the way it seems to, I don’t know how Apple even allows it.)

I like the idea of enabling one-way video calls to people who don’t have a camera. Sometimes you just want to show someone something, and 2-way doesn’t really matter.

vincenz said:
If it works over 3G, then it'll be news.
Click to expand...

Bigger news: when something replaces 3G (and I don’t mean early marketing-hype 4G) that widely and consistently offers sufficient bandwidth and quality to make video calls work well! It will happen.
Click to expand...

I hate to be the resident <insert app name> has been doing this for a while .... But the app Tango has been doing this for a while, and it's free, and works over 3G, and works on android too. It's pretty remarkable, but of course the uphill battle exists still bc no one has really heard of it. U can do one-way video calls, or two way, switch cameras during the chat, and it'll work on 3G 4G or wifi. Skype would (should) be really successful in this venture because of it's already existing user base.

But in the meantime, check out tango. Works pretty well
 
smileyborg

smileyborg

macrumors 6502
May 12, 2009
267
0
MacRumors said:
The help document, available through the online help portion of the Skype iPhone application, curiously notes that users of a number of iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad models can use video calling despite the fact that not all of these devices are camera-enabled.
Click to expand...

Why is this curious? As the help document explains, the devices without cameras can still receive video from another user with a camera -- they just can't transmit video since they don't have a camera.
 
C

Cougarcat

macrumors 604
Sep 19, 2003
7,766
2,553
HLdan said:
Yeah, they are spending time working on this crap when they need to focus on fixing Skype 5.0 for Mac. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Different teams. They can work on more than one thing at once. :rolleyes:

vincenz said:
If it works over 3G, then it'll be news.
Click to expand...

The help document says that it does:

You can make Skype video calls by using a WiFi or 3G connection. The quality of the video will depend upon the available network conditions.
Click to expand...
 
S

soapsuds

macrumors member
Nov 28, 2004
59
0
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Unless I missed FaceTime for Mac/Win coming out, will this be the first iPhone-to-PC video chat?
 
H

HenMaster6000

macrumors regular
Dec 16, 2003
142
0
Surprised it's taken this long. Mobile -> Desktop is the most common situation when I'd want to use Facetime, and currently this is cumbersome on WiFi and impossible on 3G. I'm psyched about Skype filling in this hole.

Also, why doesn't Apple support Facetime to iChat?
 
H

HenMaster6000

macrumors regular
Dec 16, 2003
142
0
soapsuds said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8C148 Safari/6533.18.5)

Unless I missed FaceTime for Mac/Win coming out, will this be the first iPhone-to-PC video chat?
Click to expand...

you did.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom