Zoom launches immersive view that places participants in one virtual background, here is how to enable it

The tool, known as immersive view, aims to make zoom meetings more engaging and collaborative. Meeting and webinar hosts can select Zoom’s immersive view the same way they would select the speaker or gallery view.

Video conferencing platforms have thrived in the past year, owing to the pandemic and the need for social distancing that gave rise to virtual classes, meetings and conferences. Video calling apps keep rolling out new features for an enhanced user experience. Zoom, the video calling platform has enabled a tool that will allow meeting hosts to arrange up to 25 participants into a single virtual background. The tool, known as immersive view, aims to make Zoom meetings more engaging and collaborative. Meeting and webinar hosts can select Zoom’s immersive view the same way they would select the speaker or gallery view. Zoom notes that when hosts enable immersive view, they will have the option to automatically or manually place participants into a virtual scene of their choosing. Hosts can also easily move participants around that scene and even resize a participant’s image for a more natural experience. In case there are over 25 participants, they will be displayed in a thumbnail strip on the top of the scene. Zoom notes that users will still have their available meeting capacity and can host participants without restriction. Users can also choose gallery view if they have a large number of participants. To view participants in the immersive view settings, users should have zoom which is higher than version 5.6.3. ­ Zoom desktop and mobile apps that do not support Immersive View will continue to see other meeting participants in either gallery view or speaker view, just with a simple black background. Others in the meeting will still view these unsupported participants in the Immersive View scene with their original backgrounds.