Instant Messaging on Android with Google Cloud Messaging

Question

I was just looking at the new Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) and I was wondering if it is possible to use GCM for Instant Messaging on your Android application?

I saw

Answer 1

The official docs on Google Cloud Messaging for Android does mention that GCM can be used to develop an instant messaging app.

...or it could be a message containing up to 4kb of payload data (so apps like instant messaging can consume the message directly).

So we went ahead and created an instant messaging app using GCM. The server-side is powered by Google App Engine. You can read the complete tutorial here. Create an Instant Messaging app using Google Cloud Messaging (GCM)

So it is possible to use GCM for Instant Messaging on Android, to answer your question. However, reliability of GCM compared to XMPP for IM is another topic.