Hi Everyone,
I was saddened to see that Google will be sunsetting Jamboard late in 2024. I love Jamboard but since it only has about a year to live, I'm thinking of other alternatives to it.
What are you using as Jamboard alternatives that provide digital whiteboard space?
Thanks for your thoughts,
Steve Schmidt, Moderator
LINCS Reading and Writing Group
Comments
Hi Steve, Ashly, and all, Thanks for this post. I, too, am so disappointed that Jamboard will no longer be available. I would love to know of alternatives to Jamboard that -- I hope!-- offer the same features and that are FREE. One of my favorite features of Jamboard is that one can easily search Google photos to automatically embed into a Jam. I look forward to hearing about useful options.
Cheers, Susan Finn Miller
Moderator, English Language Acquisition Group
In reading about Google's phasing out of Jamboard, it appears that Google has been making efforts to draw in other companies to link in and integrate with their massive library of services. They have been so successful in fact that when Apple decided their $80 Apple TV boxes for TVs could not keep pace with Google Chromecast service that was half that price, the two companies cut a deal so that all Chromecasts now offer AppleTV connectivity. To cover the licensing with Apple, Google did have to bump up their Chromecasts $10-$20. There is currently some legal concerns about many players all joining one force and how that applies to current monopoly laws, but until laws prohibit it, big companies will likely increase their absorption of smaller services to integrate tools more efficiently.
In that spirit, it is much cheaper for Google to simply allow existing whiteboard companies to link to their Google services than it is for Google to try to manage, maintain and keep innovating within Whiteboard realms. It looks like at least three products have come forward to try to work their way into becoming "the chosen one" that really gets support in replacing the service and getting Google's endorsement. Knowing Google, they would likely allow any and all that follow the necessary rules to integrate to join in and let the people decide over time which service ultimately receives any sort of endorsement.
Current projects that Google shares they are working with to integrate with are:
FigJam: Seems to have many similar features. Their free version includes many templates and allows a free user to have three boards saved at a time. It allows unlimited number of collaborators as well as allowing you to download any number of boards should you need to "archive" one of your three available board slots to start a new collaboration.
Lucidspark: Again many of the same features. Their free version includes the use of emojis, commenting tools, and tools to help gather, sort and organize items on the board. Free accounts get 3 concurrent boards available.
Miro: This one is my personal favorite and I hope they continue to build on the successes they already have set up. Free accounts get 3 whiteboard collaboration spaces. Free users get access to many templates including templates other users continue to make and share. For educators looking to create a sort of asynchronous experience, there is now a feature to allow voice recording to help navigate through the whiteboard you create! One of the strongest features is the fact that Miro already is integrating with 100s of other services including the very popular Google Drive and Zoom systems. I am assuming that this product stands the greatest chance of becoming the integrated whiteboard to replace Jamboard in Google Meet service's whiteboard integrations.
Do others have any thoughts on any of these three options or maybe have seen other options we can all explore and try out? With the closer of Jamboard scheduled for next school year, I don't see any need to make any sort of transitions over to another service until we see more about how the integration efforts go. We live in an age where the assimilation of services and start ups is commonplace and big organizations like Google don't dump a service without having some plan for how to keep it's users able to have access.
Of course, if you don't like Google or can't use it in your environment, the services shared above work fine as stand alone :) I am very keen on supporting the incredible integration of products and efficient workflows that Google has developed in the last 20 years, so I am a bit bias in assuming that integration with the other Google tools would be important.
Awesome summary, thanks, Edward!
Thanks for the helpful summary of possible alternatives. I work with immigrants and refugee adults and families, and especially folks who are beginning on one or more axes (ESL, Literacy, Digital literacy etc.) I started using Jamboard because it's Google and many of the adults have kids in our public school system, which uses Google. Plus, it's fairly simple to use, especially for the cell-phone + social media -only crowd. (For academic work, I prefer MIcrosoft, which is more sophisticated and conceptual, but you choose your products according to your interlocutors and purposes.)
You can make Jamboards in advance . You can take images from Google search and either plunk them in as movable objects or set one as the immovable background (instead of the lines or grids). For more tech sophisticated folks, you can share via e-mail, Google Drive or link. For the lower-tech folks, you can save frames as PDFs and share in a WhatsApp text or group. And you can even share your screen on a WhatsApp videoconference call (So if you have the Jamboard app on your phone, you share that.) [This doesn't work with voice calls though.)
If Miro does work with Google Drive and Zoom, it might be helpful. (Out of curiosity, does Miro work with Microsoft Teams?) I like the idea of the voice recording feature of Miro. For asynchronous work, the best that I knew how to do was to send WhatsApp messages + PDF's from Jamboards + a voice recording. . . . I know, yeah, I'd like all sorts of fancy-pants multi-purpose functionality, for free with features that work as scaffolding to help those with limited digital literacy. I still believe in the tooth fairy too.
I do not personally have experience with Microsoft Teams and Miro, but my buddy Google shares the following ...
Hope that helps!
Thanks for getting the conversation started! I plan on doing a live discussion in February! In the meantime, I am searching high and low for the best alternative. We are currently exploring FigJam. I would love to hear what everyone else is using!
FigJam is a tool by Figma for online teamwork. It lets groups create, sort, and explore ideas together. FigJam boards are interactive and support multiple users. People can react to each other’s work and express their feelings with fun “emotes”.
Here are some key features:
As you can see, FigJam offers not only the same features and Jamboard along with the opportunity to import previously made Jamboards into their software, but they offer so much more!
Unfortunately, the free version only allows for three files. However, within those files, you can have unlimited collaborators, plugs and templates, mobile app option, music player, timer, and cursor chat. Though there are limitations, I think it would be worth giving a try!
Share what alternatives you have tried or are trying at your program!
I'm not loving our options at all. Since Zoom Whiteboard was updated I'm feeling encouraged about that and also thinking about how pageless Google Docs or Google Slides would work. I just think the beauty of Jamboard was always in its simplicity and these other tools have an overwhelming number of options/features in their toolbars.
You all may know that in World Ed's CrowdED Learning initiative, focused on shareable and reusable OER, we've created and shared a lot of Jamboard activities. So, we're "crowd"sourcing now to draft a blog post on some tools that can be used in place of Jamboard. We're also thinking about providing different opportunities to explore - perhaps in an EdTech Maker Space, EdTech Strategy Session, or during the COABE strand meeting. Stay tuned!!
If you have suggestions or want to share your experience with some of the tools above, fill out this form.
Thank you, Rachel, this is exactly why I love Jamboard, for it's simplity. I work with beginner level ESL learners and I don't need nor do they the complexity that these other tools have. Figjam has entirely too many features, it's overwhelming. Miro seems slightly more accessible but I'm still not convinced. Look forward to hearing other ideas.
I feel the same! I am already missing the ease of use!
I’m playing with this one a bit. It is simple but you’re limited in the number of boards you can have and with the focus being on sticky notes I think it won’t end up having as much open-ended possibilities as Jamboard. https://sticky.studio/
I am intrigued. I am going to play around with it as well.
I am seeing the same issue with everything I have looked at: limited boards on the free plan. Let the search continue! It looks like Sticky Studio allows up to 5, but so may others only offer 3. :(
Though it took me some time and persistence, I found out the Figjam has a free educator account. This might be a game changer for me. We are exploring it here at TCALL. I will keep everyone updated. It has potential if nothing else. If anyone is interested, you have to go to this link and it takes about 24 hours to be verified. Of course, adult education is not listed, so I improvised.
Check out this free and EASY whiteboard option: https://www.notebookcast.com/en
Hi, and thanks for the reviews of tools!
Personally, I love good ol' Padlet because of its ease of use. - students don't need to register, very few clicks to make a simple post - and the many multimedia options including recording a video on the site.
You can set it so students can like or upvote and comment.
https://padlet.com/site/product for features.
A free account only allows three Padlets but subscriptions are pretty low cost:
https://padlet.com/site/subscriptions
I've used it with students and for PD.
+1 to Diana's comment about Padlet. No downloads, updates, or passwords needed (for students)! It doesn't offer the shared kinetic space feeling of a jamboard, but it offers an accessible experience to help support many kinds of engagement (and a record of what was done and created).
That said, my intermediate adult ESOL class this fall engaged with padlet activities less than previous groups, but it may have been that we didn't spend enough time with it during class time, and some students were not set up to switch between Zoom and a browser (it's a remote class). 🤔 However, in that case, I'd expect them to have the same issue with jamboard (or most other solutions...).
One more benefit I've gotten out of Padlet: As a teacher with a paid account, I can create padlets for each student, and then copy over posts they made from class activities in order to create a kind of portfolio of the contributions and recordings that students have made throughout the term. This kind of summative portfolio can be really rewarding to see and reflect on (for both the students and me). After they review all the posts they made, they can record a final reflection on what they've practiced and learned during the class. And, they can keep the link to the portfolio if they want to save their work or show it to others. 👍