- Quick specs
- Price: Free
- Operating system: Windows Me, Windows NT, Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 98
- Date added: January 11, 2009
- Total Downloads: 566,195
- Downloads last week: 1,361
- See full specifications
A newer version of Pidgin is available.
(Download doesn't provide access to previous versions of this program.)
- CNET editors' rating: stars
- Average user rating: stars out of 220 votes
See all user reviews
CNET editors' review
Reviewed by: CNET Staff
Your mother uses AOL Instant Messenger. Your spouse prefers MSN. Your office insists on Yahoo. What are you going to do? You could run all those chat clients at once, or you could use Gaim, now renamed Pidgin. Like Trillian, Fire, and other third-party IM clients, this open-source messaging application lets you access multiple IM networks from one window, including Google Talk and MySpaceIM as well as lesser-known protocols such as Jabber and Gadu-Gadu.
Pidgin's biggest change is the redesigned interface. The Buddy List can be viewed in Basic or Advanced mode, and the most important features, including the Plug-in List, have been graduated from the Preferences window into their own panes. Twenty-two plug-ins come prepackaged as Pidgin repositions itself as a highly extensible chat client.
The IM features are unimpeachable: smileys (you can find tons of emoticons on the developer's site), file transfers, and multiperson chats. The Buddy Pounce feature lets you automatically perform certain actions (play a sound, execute a command, open an IM window) when a contact signs on or off. Pidgin also gets lots of intangibles right: logging and time-stamping, for instance, are well-executed and easy to access. However, it lacks IP telephony and video conferencing, and there are still some bugs--most notably in the Help menu. Still, Pidgin remains a highly recommended text-only messaging app.
Publisher's description
From Pidgin :Pidgin (formerly known as Gaim) is a multi-protocol instant messaging client for BSD and Windows. It is compatible with AIM (Oscar and TOC protocols), ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo, IRC, Jabber, Gadu-Gadu, and Zephyr networks. Pidgin users can log in to multiple accounts on multiple IM networks simultaneously. This means that you can be chatting with friends on AOL Instant Messenger, talking to a friend on Yahoo Messenger, and sitting in an IRC channel all at the same time. It also goes beyond that and provides many unique features. A few popular features are Buddy Pounces, which give the ability to notify you, send a message, play a sound, or run a program when a specific buddy goes away, signs online, or returns from idle; and plugins, consisting of text replacement, a buddy ticker, extended message notification, and iconify on away.
What's new in this version:
Fix the "Hang on Exit" issue that a number of users encountered, Fix a connection timeout with empty Gadu-Gady buddy lists, Fix a crash that occurred when retrieving certain Offline Messages on MSN.
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User reviews of Pidgin 2.5.4
- Average user rating: 4.0 stars out of 220 votes
- My rating: 0 stars Write review
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Showing 5 of 7 user reviewsSee all 7 user reviews
This software version | All versions -
Version: Pidgin 2.5.4
Pros: Its really a very good programme in every front, better than any other, as far as I have seen, & it supports all of them and doesnt eats up Ram, its wonderful
Cons: Nothing that I know of
Summary: Very good programme
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Version: Pidgin 2.5.4
"It doesn't work properly with the network"
Pros: nothing ...
Cons: disconnect a lot ... even in a high speed ADSL .
old shape window with few options -
Version: Pidgin 2.5.4
"Great Program - Does what is should and nothing more!"
Pros: It integrates seemlessly with all of the major internet chat programs. It is extremely simple to set up and use. The interface is very intuitive.
Cons: While Pidgin is quite good, you do lose some of the more advance features of individual chat programs. I don't know them all because However, Yahoo!'s voice chat feature is pretty awesome and you cannot do this in Pidgin.
Summary: Great program. It's simple and intuitive. There's no spyware of any negative side effect to think of that sometimes comes with other free programs. However, you lose some of the most advance features of the individual internet chat programs.
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0 out of 1 people found this review helpful
Version: Pidgin 2.5.4
Pros: Simple interface
Cons: It just doesn't work. I entered my yahoo account in but it kept returning message "unable to authenticate" so left it disabled. So i tried it with a seperate MSN account and STILL the ame thing happened.
Summary: I attempted to report this problem but the website form page kept failing. I've searched and found other people having this problem with no solution provided. This problem happened with v2.5.4. I have since updated to v2.5.5 but the same thing happe... read more >>
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Version: Pidgin 2.5.4
Pros: Much better than the windows live suite with messenger, faster and all accounts in an one
Cons: It doesn't support video chat, you will need to install skype for this
Summary: Use always freeware and open source programs
- See all 7 user reviews Write review
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