Houseparty App For iOS And Android Lets You Group Video Chat With Your Friends

The makers of Meerkat, the popular video streaming app, have announced a new app called Houseparty, which lets you group video chat when “you and your friends are in the app at the same time.”

The Houseparty app was under a pseudonym for at least 10 months, and has more than 1 million users, according to the Verge. The company —whose original name is Life on Air —is located in San Francisco.

The Houseparty app hit the the App Store in the beginning of May but had numerous problems, one being that it didn’t always work. In August, the app was struggling to stay in the App Store’s top 1,500 iPhone apps, according to App Annie.

Houseparty’s CEO Ben Rubin said, “On the surface it feels like it’s a super-fast ‘group FaceTime,’ and what’s gets us really excited is that it’s actually the atomic unit (first step) for our vision to build asynchronous social network where people hang with their friends when they are apart.”

The company met with fraternities, sororities, and other student groups to show them how to use the Houseparty app for iOS and Android. College students started to use the Houseparty app to make plans and do homework, and it took off.

The Houseparty app has some interesting features that will stand out to a young crowd. When a friend of a friend enters your chat, a “Stranger danger!” warning will flash on your screen. You can also wave to your friends and invite them to join you. If you’re worried about other people trying to join your group video chat, you can easily lock your room so they can’t join.

You can now download the Houseparty app for iOS and Android.