New adaptive meeting layouts in Hangouts Meet

Adaptive layouts in Hangouts Meet. What’s changing

Hangouts Meet is launching adaptive layouts that automatically adjust to give you the best view of the people and presentations in your meeting:

Spotlight 
The spotlight layout keeps the focus on the presentation or a single speaker. It’s used when you’re in a meeting with just one other participant, when you pin someone, and when there’s a presentation but no active speakers with video on.

Tiled 
The tiled layout shows up to four participants on the screen to make your meetings feel more inclusive. This will be the default for smaller meetings when there is no presentation.

Side by side 
The side by side layout shows up to three speakers in a larger format next to the presentation. This allows you to continue to see the presenter as they speak. This is the default when there’s a presentation and there are active speakers with video on.

Sidebar 
The sidebar layout improves on the existing Meet layout by showing several additional participants in the same vertical space and using rectangular feeds to avoid participants on the edge being cropped out. This will be the default for larger meetings when there is no presentation.

In addition to seeing these layouts automatically used depending on the meeting needs, users can select a preferred layout from the Change layout dialog.

Who’s impacted

End users

Why you’d use it

These new layouts provide the user with a more inclusive and collaborative view of the meeting, allowing for easier interaction with remote participants while still maintaining focus on the content being presented.

How to get started

• Admins: No action required.
• End users: You’ll see the new layouts in your next Hangouts Meet meeting once the feature has rolled out to you.

Additional details

The new layouts are available on Hangouts Meet web clients and Hangouts Meet hardware.

Helpful links

To learn more about layouts in Hangout Meets, see our Help Center. 

Availability

Rollout details 

• Rapid Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on April 30, 2019
• Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting no earlier than May 14, 2019.

G Suite editions 

• Available to all G Suite editions.

On/off by default? 

• The new layouts are replacing the existing layout and will be enabled by default.

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