Google Meet is one of the best video chat services available, especially if you're someone or a company that's heavily invested in Google's ecosystem. Google has been doing a great job adding features to the service over the past couple of months, with a new picture-in-picture mode, support for 1080p video, and more. While this latest update isn't the most exciting, it does bring some quality-of-life improvements, making it much easier to access video effects and also adding a reframing tool.
The news was picked up by Android Police, and was featured on the Google Workspace Updates page, with the company sharing that users will now be able to access some of its most popular visual effects features from a quick-access menu that will appear when hovering over one's own video feed. The new menu will allow users to reframe the image, and easily access the blur setting, along with all the backgrounds and filters. Users will also have the ability to turn off a video feed from the new menu as well. Of course, if you don't like this new menu system, you can still access the visual effects through the traditional kebab menu towards the bottom of the UI.
The update is now rolling out to all Google Workspace customers. The reframing feature will only be available for paid or educational Google Workspace accounts, and those that subscribe to Google One with a 2TB or larger plan. Those on Rapid Release domains can expect the new menu to be available by the end of the week. Those that are on Scheduled Release domains will begin to see it starting on July 5, 2023, with Google stating that it will take up to two weeks for a full rollout. For those that have access, you will be able to see the new menu system by simply hovering over your own image in the video call.