Von Neumann orbit equivalence

Abstract We generalize the notion of orbit equivalence to the non-commutative setting by introducing a new equivalence relation on groups, which we call von Neumann orbit equivalence (vNOE). We prove the stability of this equivalence relation under taking free products and graph products of groups. To achieve this, we introduce vNOE of tracial von Neumann algebras, show that two countable discrete groups $\Gamma $ and $\Lambda $ are vNOE if and only if the corresponding group von Neumann algebras $L\Gamma $ and $L\Lambda $ are vNOE, and that vNOE of tracial von Neumann algebras is stable under taking free products and graph products of tracial von Neumann algebras.