You can chat with a contact who is in your Yahoo! Contacts, who has a Yahoo! ID, and who is signed into Yahoo! Mail or Yahoo! Messenger. Your chat appears in a conversation tab in the Yahoo! Mail window. You’ll know a contact is available to chat if you see the person’s name in your online contacts list.

Notes:

You can chat with several contacts at the same time, each in its own tab. It’s not possible for several people to chat together in a single conversation.

You cannot use the chat feature inside Yahoo! Mail and be logged into Yahoo! Messenger at the same time.

Here’s How

1. Make sure that you are available to chat within Yahoo! Mail. (Remind me how.)
2. Check that the people you want to chat with are in your Yahoo! Contacts and have chat ID information. (See the Getting Started With Yahoo! Contacts tutorial if you need help adding contacts.)
3. If you don’t see your online contacts in the left pane of the Mail window, click the arrow next to Online, to display them.
4. Click the name of the contact you want to chat with.A conversation tab opens where you can begin your chat.
5. Type your message in the message input box, then press the Enter key or click the Send button.Your messages and your contact’s replies appear in the conversation area.