Earlier today we announced that Skype for iPhone now supports video calling over 3G and WiFi. Now that we’ve had a few hours of hands on time with the updated app, it’s time to run through some of the details and our initial thoughts. Has Skype for iPhone just made FaceTime obsolete?
When you fire up Skype for iPhone after installing the update, you’ll notice that your ‘Online Contacts’ now have a video icon to the right of their name, the same icon used for Apple’s FaceTime. Clicking a contact brings up their status, the options to call/chat/sms and a new feature — ‘video call’.
When you initiate a video call, it immediately enables your front-facing camera and begins the call. Switching between portrait and landscape mode works seamlessly. Up at the top, you’ll see two options: camera and mute. You have the choice between using ‘front camera’, ‘back camera’, or ‘no camera’. The transition between the cameras is instant and we had no problem using the mute feature.
Now for the important part — video quality. Since FaceTime is limited to WiFi video calling (at least for now), the only real direct competitor to Skype is Fring. After pulling the service from Fring’s Add-Ons earlier this year, Skype took a considerable amount of time before rolling out their video calling feature. Without a doubt it was worth the wait. The quality of voice and video is superb.
Skype for iPhone allows use of the back camera, a feature we can’t seem to activate on the Fring iPhone client (however, it works on our Android handsets). The audio quality you’ve grown to expect from Skype, still exists while using video — this is a key differentiator between Fring and Skype. Even with the introduction of Fring’s DVQ (dynamic video quality), the quality of audio failed to impress even though image quality improved. Lastly, Skype is used by a tremendous amount of desktop and laptop users worldwide, using both Mac OS and Windows. This is Skype’s blockbuster feature. It is also worth noting that you can share your desktop with an iPhone user, the same way you can share your desktop between standard Skype clients.
Overall, we’re thoroughly impressed with Skype for iPhone. The audio quality remains top notch and the video quality is on par with FaceTime. Being able to Skype from your iPhone with video opens a whole new world of functionality to video calls. The bar has now been set, hopefully Apple will embrace the new competition and add 3G video calling to FaceTime in 2011. For now, Skype for iPhone is the video calling app to beat.
Out now | £free | Skype
