The clubhouse is back! The app that popularized social audio rooms is reinventing it “to be more like a messaging app,” with a new audio-only group chat called “Chat,” the company details in a blog post. explained.
Think of chats like group Instagram Stories with your voice. You can record a voice message, start a chat, and send the chat to your friends. Users can then add their own voice recordings to create a kind of voice collage or conversation.
The app has been completely redesigned around these new chats. When I opened the newly updated app, it prompted me to start a new chat and share. Chats are also the first thing you’ll see on the app’s new home tab, and if you have friends who use Clubhouse, they’ll appear on the home tab as well.
Clubhouse has seen a significant drop in popularity since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially since the social network formerly known as Twitter launched its own Spaces social audio room. Spaces continue to be a key feature of Elon Musk’s X, but Clubhouse is now more focused on encouraging people to voice chat with friends rather than live stream to large audiences. You seem to think you have more opportunities.
You can still create the type of live social audio room that made Clubhouse a hit, but this feature was a bit buried for me. To start the room, I had to tap the mic button from the home screen and swipe to the “tap to go live” option. Clubhouse says the live room “will continue to be a core part of Clubhouse.”
The revised app is now available for iOS and Android. You can read more about all the app changes (including removed features) in this post on the Clubhouse website.