Epic Games’ New Voice Chat Lets You Keep Talking To Friends While Playing Different Games
Epic Games has announced that it's going to make it easier than ever to hang out and talk with friends across different platforms by launching Epic Parties. This voice chat service will work across Fortnite (on all supported platforms), the Epic Games Store launcher (PC, iOS, and Android), and the Epic Games app (iOS and Android). For example, you can start a voice party from your phone or PC launcher, ring up a friend who is busy playing Fortnite on their PlayStation, and even transfer that call from your phone to your PC when you get back to your desk. This means that you can sit in on a voice call through the Epic PC Launcher while playing completely different games from your Epic library. Other benefits include a seamless approach to grouping friends together, as Epic says that if you're in a voice party with friends and everyone decides to open Fortnite, then the game will automatically drop you all into the same lobby together. This new feature is competing directly with Discord, which has been the go-to third-party app for users for several years. Epic's built-in alternative aims to let users bring their social list, voice channels, and digital avatar with them across multiple platforms and from game to game, whether you are on iOS, Android, PC, or console. Epic has also hinted that these voice and avatar systems will be integrated directly into Unreal Engine 6, and the tools will be offered to other developers in time. For now, it's currently rolling out to Fortnite, and Epic Parties will be available in Rocket League next year. According to Epic's year-in-review stats, over $1 billion was spent in the store in 2025, and it reached an all-time record of 78 million monthly active users on PC. Earlier this year, Epic spoke more about its plans to further improve its digital storefront. "Our goal is to keep building a storefront and launcher that players want to engage with and use to grow their game library, but we need to be able to connect players with the game they want to play at the time they want to play it," Kyle Billings, director of strategy and business operations at the Epic Games Store, said to GameSpot.
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