Many were shocked when Google introduced its unified messaging platform Hangouts, with no SMS integration to be found. Luckily, Google won't leave users high and dry. Dori Storbeck, Google+ community manager of Hangouts and Chat, confirmed in a thread on the social network that SMS integration will indeed be coming to the platform.

Storbeck didn't offer any word on when the SMS integration would be released, but said "it is one of our most requested features". Right now, Hangouts covers the full-spectrum of Google, replacing Google Talk and extending itself across all services - except Google Voice. Available for iOS and Android, the apps have been designed by Google to allow people to communicate with each other across platforms over the internet without worrying what type of message to use, or what device their contact may own. It can be used to video call, talk, text, share photos and much more. 

Google Hangouts competitor Apple iMessage features the ability to sync a phone number into the service for SMS. Presumably, Google would do it the same way, letting you comunicate via your phone number through a web view. It'd be interesting to see how the SMS messaging would work on iOS, given strict APIs that have been set in-place by Apple. 

Google Hangouts has been a long time coming, as the company's messaging services have been sprawled out for many years (Google even admitted this during the keynote). SMS integration would be the cherry on top.