Updated 15 Feb, 2012, 1:21 pm IST

Top 10 Web-Based Instant Messengers

22 Nov, 2006, 3:30 pm IST | Aalaap Ghag

No more downloading messenger software - just login from your web browser and chat away.

AIM Express
Not many of us have an AOL Instant Messenger account or even the need to have one, so not many sysadmins would feel the need to go and block AIM, at least in India. But if you’re one of the few AIM screen name holders, you’re in luck, as AIM Express is AOL’s official, original web-based client for their instant messenger. I had some trouble logging into it while I was writing this, so I couldn’t take a screenshot, but I’ll try it again later.

ICQ2Go
People still use ICQ? No, not in India. At least I don’t know anyone who knows anyone who uses ICQ today. But why leave the list incomplete? ICQ2Go is the official web-based client for ICQ, one of the first instant messengers in the world. The client, being completely Flash-based, gives it full application-like flexibility, including fancy window sliding effects and all the original sounds that we’ve grown up with. ICQ2Go offers a good amount of settings, almost like the full ICQ application, and it also is SMS-enabled, if anyone still uses that feature.

Google Talk via Gmail
This is actually the 11th item in this list of top '10' web-based instant messengers, and it’s also the most popular and utilized one, but I didn’t feel it right to include somewhat obscure links like MSN2Go and exclude Google Talk via Gmail.

Eleven is a lot of options to choose from, but there’s always room for more. Especially when these get very popular and consequently useless. I think I’ve covered pretty much each and every web-based instant messenger here, but if I’ve missed out any, post a comment and enlighten me.

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Tags: Internet , Web-based , MSN Messenger , Windows Live Messenger , Yahoo! Messenger , Google Talk , ICQ , AOL Instant Messenger , Jabber

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