Now that so many people in our community are practicing social distancing and staying home when possible, we thought there might be interest in learning more about the various video chat options out there. To that end, we've rounded up some resources to help you get started.

Your preferred solution for video chat may depend on what devices you and the people you want to chat with have available, whether you and your friends and family are already familiar with one of the platforms offering video chat features, the number of people who can video chat at once on a given platform, privacy or security concerns, available features, and other considerations.

These recent articles from USA Today and TechCrunch discuss pros and cons of a variety of video chat options, and could serve as a good starting point in researching your preferred platform(s), but we also recommend digging deeper to find more info and reviews on the platform(s) you find most interesting. In particular, you may want to look for articles from trusted sources on privacy and security concerns that may affect your preferred platform(s). As these products gain in popularity, information on security and privacy issues is developing rapidly. For example, see this recent article on Zoom from NPR.

Once you've identified one or two products that may meet your needs and those of the people you want to communicate with, the next step is learning how to get started using them. We hope the following guides and tutorials we've found may prove helpful to you in that process.

WhatsApp - Product Page, General FAQ

FaceTime - Product Page

Google Duo - Product Page, Help & FAQ

Google Hangouts - Product Page, Help & FAQ

Skype - Product Page, Features, Skype Support Page

Zoom - Product Page, General FAQ

Facebook Messenger - Product Page, Help Center