Who knew video chatting would become so essential to our daily lives?

In a time of social distancing and isolation, it is important to have the best of the best in terms of apps to be able to stay connected to friends and loved ones via video chat. No one likes bad audio, bad video and just plain bad service and we all like to get a little creative and have fun on video calls with filters and other advantages. However there are so many apps out there to use it can kind of be overwhelming to pick the best ones. So, I am here to give you my top 5 Best Video Chat Apps!

I am by no means an expert with this but rather these are just based off of my experiences with these apps. I will say up front, I am not including Facetime on this list as I do not own any Apple Products and therefore cannot use Facetime. Here is my list:

1. Skype: This is first because it is reliable and free. I have never had to pay, have created a free account and it is easy to use. Unfortunately, it can have really bad video connections or audio sometimes but if you are just hopping on for a comfort call and not a work meeting that is really important, it does the job well.

2. Zoom: I have just started using this and love that it has the best audio and video quality that I have found. I am even recording a podcast on there. I do not love that in order to use fun filters or have more that 2 people on a call for longer than 40 minutes you have to subscribe and pay a fee for an account for more minutes and features.

3. Snapchat: I did not know you could video chat until about a year ago (yes, I am behind on this) on this app. It is so easy to just tap on a person's snap and video call. The video quality isn't the best but it does allow more than 2 people for free. However, it gets tiring holding your small screen the whole time and can hurt your eyesight.

4. Instagram: This is another feature I just learned a few months ago! I don't use this often because I still have it in my mind that IG is just for posting pictures but you can video call with up to 4 people and use the filters that Instagram already has.

5. Microsoft Teams: So, I learned about this through my job. They told us how they were setting up Microsoft teams which is basically a way to communicate with the whole company and you can have video chats whenever and with whomever and it has great quality. Unfortunately, I do not know how it works outside of a work environment but I am sure it is not free.

Happy Video Chatting!

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