Clubhouse shifts focus to Audio Messaging, introduces 'Chats' to combat waning popularity

Clubhouse, the social audio app recognized as one of the main alternatives to Twitter Spaces (now XSpaces, I guess), has undergone a significant transformation and is changing its focus to become more of an audio messaging platform. The shift aims to combat waning popularity and emphasizes the app's core belief in active conversation over passive listening.

The update introduces a feature named "Chats," which operate kinda like Instagram stories but with voice recordings rather than visual content. Users can start a chat by recording a voice message and sharing it with friends, who can then add their own voice recordings, enabling a dynamic conversation. The app's layout has been overhauled to highlight these new chats, featuring them prominently on the home tab.

While Clubhouse continues to support live social audio rooms ('Houses'), this feature is less prominent and accessed via the microphone button. Despite this, the platform maintains that live rooms will stay an essential part of its platform, with options for creators to establish dedicated Houses for their followers. Text posts in Houses are being replaced by voice Chats, and text Direct Messages (DMs) are being replaced by voice messaging (VMs). Topic-based recommendations are also being replaced with AI-based suggestions over time. Several legacy features in Houses and rooms, including automated system messages, pinned messages, new member questions, room-level hand-raise queues, and the ability to take closed house rooms public, are no longer supported. Legacy broadcasting features in rooms, such as the Insights tab and on-platform reshares, are also being phased out.

The updated app, available for iOS and Android users, also includes other changes detailed in a post on the Clubhouse website. There are a lot of changes, so you should really check it out if you're a regular user or planning to try it.