What you need to know
- Google Meet is rolling out a live sharing feature.
- The new capability will allow meeting participants to interact with videos, songs or games being shared.
- It will support Spotify and YouTube, as well as a few games.
Video meetings can get quite monotonous in the process, so Google is introducing a new live sharing feature to Meet to save call participants from boring corporate speak.
Google has announced (opens in new tab) that it is launching live sharing on Meet to give call participants a fun way to spend their breaks. The live sharing feature was previously spotted in an app teardown a few days ago. It will take your group call to another service that you want to live-share with other participants.
Currently, it supports a handful of apps and games, including YouTube, Spotify, Heads Up!, UNO! Mobile, and Kahoot! Google Meet’s integration with these services will allow you to watch YouTube videos or listen to Spotify songs with your group study mates or office colleagues during an icebreaker, for example.
To get started, simply tap the overflow menu and open the “Activities” section. From there, you’ll find a list of services that you can share with other people in your call. When you choose to launch Spotify, for example, the call will be redirected to the music streaming service via its group session mode. Spotify launched this feature in 2020 to make it easier to share a music experience with distant friends, though it’s currently only available to Premium subscribers.
Google said that it also started adding these new features to the Duo app over the past few weeks in light of the app’s confusing transition to Meet. The update is set to be completed on smartphones and tablets before the end of the month.
It should be noted that Meet already supports sharing your screen with call participants. However, that experience is confined within a group meeting instead of taking the call to a third-party service.
Meet’s live sharing feature was also teased during the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 announcement on Wednesday. However, its availability and the list of supported apps vary by device and country.
