Facebook introduced video calling, group chat and a new design on Wednesday during the social network's much-heralded "awesome" announcement.
Wearing his signature grey t-shirt and blue jeans, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced the features at a press conference in Palo Alto, Calif.
Facebook Video Calling was developed with Skype, the world's largest Internet phone company.
Users with a webcam on their computer will have to install a special plug-in before they can make calls using Facebook from inside their web browser.
Callers will be able to see and hear the recipient, and vice-versa.
With the group chat feature, users can talk with several other Facebook friends at the same time using only text.
"We think this is going to be something that's really valuable," Zuckerberg said. "A lot of people have asked for it."
In Canada, the new features will only be rolled out to a small percentage of users at first, a Facebook spokesperson told CTV.ca.
Group video calling is not yet supported and it was not clear how the feature would be available to mobile users. Zuckerberg said the new tools "are mostly web features."
The design changes are aimed to make it easier for users to see a list of friends they can chat with, while taking advantage of widescreen computer displays.
Wednesday's announcement from Facebook comes almost a week after Google launched its latest social network, Google+.
Google+ is accessible on an invite-only basis, but the company is keen to get a foothold in the social networking sector.
The new service has been received with mostly positive reviews, earning praise for its Circles and Hangouts features.
Circles lets users easily drag-and-drop contacts into groupings with customizable security and privacy settings.
Hangouts, meanwhile, lets users chat and collaborate in realtime using webcams. Users may also collectively watch videos on YouTube.
