Google Meet has launched a feature to improve users’ experience in meetings and video calls. It is now possible to stop streaming a person’s video without notifying them or change the view to other participants.
This option serves to hide the video from potentially distracting users — whether it’s a very flashy virtual background or a pet that likes to appear in the camera — and help keep the focus on the presentation or moderator in a meeting.
How to Turn Off Someone’s Video in Google Meet
The ability to turn off a participant’s video in Google Meet is available both on the web and in the mobile app for all Google Workspace users.
To stop seeing a person’s video on Google Meet, you need to select the user from the list of participants in the video call. Do like this:
- Click on the meeting participants icon;
- Find the person you want to stop seeing;
- Click the three-dot button to see the options;
- Select “Do not watch” to turn off the video just for you.
Stop following the user’s video again, go back to the options and click on “start watching”. You don’t have to be the meeting admin to control which profiles you see and don’t see in Meet. The other participants will not know that you have stopped seeing a user’s camera.
In addition to this feature, Google Meet launched the “Audio Only” option to enter a meeting with all videos disabled – unless of those who are presenting in the meeting. This option is currently only available for the app on mobile devices.
Among the app’s recent innovations are even easier file sharing and the option to save subtitles in real time of recorded meetings.
