How Fachat works, one screen at a time

Home, match, call and Who's online. From the moment you open the site to the moment you are talking to someone, those four are all you pass through, and each has one control doing most of the work. Learn those four and you have learned the product.

Notice what is missing from the list below: a registration form. You do not create an account to begin. That step simply is not there. A fifth place, the profile page, is where you end up once you have found someone you want to talk to again, and it gets its own section further down.

A guest session is created for you. By the time fachat.cam has finished loading, the site has already given this browser a temporary identity, and that is what lets you start a call without typing an email address or choosing a password.

The home page itself is short on controls by design. Start video chat is the main one. Beside it is a link to Who's online, for visitors who would rather look before they leap. Everything else on the page is reading material, and you can ignore all of it.

It asks the browser for your camera and microphone, then looks for another adult who is waiting right then, and links the pair of you on a live call. Matching is random, so you do not choose who answers, and there is no gender or country setting to adjust first. A match usually arrives within moments; if the call is not for you, end it and tap again.

The Reward Center, where free matches can be claimed, is at the top of the match screen. It belongs to the money side of the product, so this page leaves it at one sentence; the Fachat free page explains what you start with and where coins come in.

The ones in the table below. Most of the display belongs to the person you are talking to, with a small preview of yourself off to one side, and the controls sit around the picture. It is worth a glance at each on your first call, while nothing is going wrong.

Open Who's online. It lists the people online now, each with a photo and a name, and tapping a card opens that person's profile. From there you decide what happens next, which makes it the opposite of the match button: slower, but the choice is yours.

The list changes all the time, because it only shows who is around at that moment. Someone you saw an hour ago may have gone, and new faces will have arrived. That is a good reason to follow the people you like: a follow keeps them findable after they drop off the list.

Direct video calls to someone you picked run on coins, unlike the first random matches. Browsing the list does not start a call by itself, so nothing happens until you tap.

Three main things: follow, message and call. Together they are why one lucky random match can lead somewhere. A profile opens when you tap a card in Who's online, a name in your Following list, or the person you have just been talking to.

You do not need one to start, and there is no login gate at the front of the site. Nothing on the first screen asks for an email address or a password. You begin as a guest when the page loads, and signing in is something you may choose to do later.

It becomes worth doing once you have something to lose. A guest session belongs to a single browser. Wipe that browser's storage, or move to another phone, and the guest session does not come with you; neither do the people you followed or any coins you bought. Signing in turns the guest session into an account you can return to. If you only ever dip in from one device, you can stay a guest for as long as you like.

On a phone you may also want the site on your home screen, which the Fachat app page covers. And if anything about talking to someone new on camera makes you hesitate, read is Fachat safe first.