Talk while you code: voice chat built into the editor

For a while the workflow had a hole in it. Two people would be in the same session, cursors moving, code changing, and then one of them would type "wait let me explain" into the editor. So we would open a separate call somewhere else, alt-tab between the call and the code, and lose the thing that made the session good in the first place.

So now there is voice in the session. You open the link, click join voice, and you are talking to whoever else is on the link while you both edit the same file.

How to use it

1. Open a session and share the link, the same as always.
2. When your teammate joins, click join voice in the call dock.
3. You are connected. Talk. The code is right there.

That is the whole thing. No separate app, no meeting link, no "can you hear me now" in a third window. The voice lives where the code lives.

A few small touches that matter in practice:

• You join unmuted, because the usual reason you start a call is that you want to say something right now.
• Hold the space bar for push to talk if you would rather stay muted by default.
• The dock shows who is speaking with a little waveform, so in a group you can tell who has the floor.

How it actually works

The audio goes straight from your browser to your teammate's browser. It does not pass through our servers. This is peer to peer, which has two nice consequences: the latency is low because there is no middle hop, and it costs us nothing to run, which is part of how the whole tool stays free.

The signalling, the part where two browsers figure out how to find each other, rides the same connection the editor already uses to sync your code. So joining voice does not open some new heavy connection. It reuses what is there.

Where it works and where it does not

Peer to peer audio works for most networks. If you are both on normal home or office connections, it connects.

There is one honest limitation. Some strict corporate or mobile networks block direct browser to browser connections. When that happens, you get a clear "could not connect" message rather than a call that silently fails. We chose not to route around this with a relay server, because a relay would mean billing and a credit card, and keeping the tool free without a card is a line we did not want to cross. For the large majority of sessions, direct connection works.

Why this belongs in a code editor

The reason to put voice inside the editor instead of telling people to use a separate call is the same reason the whole tool exists. Every context switch costs you something. Pasting code into chat costs you the formatting. Opening a separate call costs you the alt-tab and the lost cursor. Each one is small, and together they are why "let me show you this real quick" turns into a ten minute fumble.

Voice in the session removes one more of those switches. You share a link, your teammate joins, you talk, you both edit, and the AI in the room is still watching the code the whole time. It is the closest thing to sitting next to someone that a browser tab can be.

Open a session and try it with someone. The talking and the typing finally happen in the same place.