As we all sit still very much in the midst of a global pandemic, video chats and calls are more a part of everyday life than they’ve ever been before. There’s no way around it at this point and most people have become quite comfortable with multiple video calling services. Google Meet and Zoom are among the most-used video calling services out there, and Google is prepping a roll-out of a new feature that could help set Meet apart from the others.
In the next couple days, Google has announced that they will be debuting full Chromecast support for Meet, allowing users to share their ongoing video call to a larger screen with a Chromecast dongle or Chromecast built in, provided you have a device running the desktop Chrome browser. In our testing, we don’t have the feature yet, but the news on this broke yesterday and Google is claiming it will be available in “a couple days.”
When it does arrive, look for the option to appear in the bottom-right corner in the 3-dot menu along with things like full-screen view and layout settings. Once you do cast a call to the big screen, Google says the audio, microphone and camera from your device will be used, so no worries about figuring out how to get a mic and camera somehow attached to your television.
As many kids will be starting this school year at home and parents will likely be joining them for work, there are going to be a few scenarios where this functionality will come in quite handy. While I don’t think a standard, interactive video call would be great with this setup, I do think long classes or presentations would make a great fit. For regular calls where you are in conversation with others, looking up to a large screen while listening and talking would come across rather odd as it would appear that you are not engaging. When you are sitting back taking in a longer session or a class, however, this setup could be absolutely perfect. Be on the lookout for this new Meet feature to be available today or tomorrow, just in time for school to get back in session.
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