You know that app in the dock of the Nexus 6 that has blue and white chat bubbles? Yeah, that’s Google’s new Messenger app, and it’s now available in the Play store.

Messenger is an Android app that lets you send and receive SMS and MMS messages. That includes group texts, videos and audio messages. Google highlights a few of the app’s features in its Play store entry:

• Faster sharing: Select or take pictures and videos directly from the app and share easily. You can even send audio messages to your contacts.
• Easy search: Search through contacts and conversation threads to find exactly what you are looking for.
• Purposeful design: New, fluid, material design that is intuitive and delightful.
• More control: Ability to block SMS senders. No interruptions when you don’t want them!
• More features: audio messages, emoji support, colored text threads, message archiving and more.

Messenger requires Android 4.1 or higher.

Messenger looks like a nice Google app that’ll fit in well with Android 5.0 Lollipop. That said, it’s kind of confusing to see Google release this app. Hangouts is already available, supports text messaging and looks good with Lollipop. Perhaps Google created Messenger for folks that don’t want to use an OEMs messaging app but don’t want Hangouts either?

If you’d like to check Messenger out for yourself, you can do just that by clicking the link below. If you do, share your first impressions of the app with us!

Via Google Play: Messenger