

In late April, the company made calls more reliable with a new video codec technology and added a quick button to capture a snapshot of the video call. Two months ago, Google claimed Duo was hosting 10 million new sign-ups per week and that there had been an 8-times surge in video call usage in “regions particularly impacted by social distancing.” You can share that link directly with participants or invite them manually.Īs demand for video calling platforms spikes across the world, Google has actively rolled out updates for its consumer-facing Duo platform. To make group video calls, all users need to do is head over to Duo’s web app, sign in with their Google accounts, and tap the Create group link button.
GOOGLE DUO GROUP CALL UPDATE
We’ve reached out to the company for more information and we’ll update the story when we hear back.Īs for mobile, Sanaz Ahari, a senior director of Product & Design at Google, said the new group call limit will arrive for Duo’s Android and iOS apps “over the next couple of weeks.” The new update will put Google Duo on par with FaceTime’s 32-person limit as well. Google hasn’t commented on whether it plans to eventually roll it out for other browsers like Firefox yet. The new 32-person Duo calls are restricted to Google’s own browser since they leverage the latest issue of a technology called WebRTC for offering end-to-end encryption, which is only available on the latest versions of Chrome. On Google Chrome for desktops, users can now have as many as 32 people in a single group Duo call. Google is once again hiking up the number of people you can video chat with on Duo, only three months after updating the limit to 12 from eight in March. It’s also completely free, which can only be a big bonus. The feature is extremely easy to use and the fact that it’s multiplatform makes it versatile, as well. Users in your group will get a notification to join the call and you will see your screen splitting, depending on the number of users on the call. You can even send a video message to the group. Tapping it and then tapping Start will allow you to initiate a group call. Once you’ve done that, the group will show in your contacts. You will also need to give your group a name after adding the contacts you want. You can select as many as 11 to add to the group, as you are the 12th in the group. Then, tap Create Group. On the next screen, you will be shown all of your contacts that currently are using Duo, with a tick next to them. Start by opening Google Duo and tapping Contacts. The screenshots below are taken in the Android version, but the steps are the same on iOS.

You can’t do it with the web version at the moment. The only catch is that creating groups needs to be done on your Android or iOS device. This makes Duo a viable tool for work meetings or larger family get-togethers. Recently, Google has announced that it has raised the limit of users able to join a group video call from eight to 12. Not to mention that calls are encrypted end-to-end, so your conversations are secure. Furthermore, it’s a great tool for doing video conferences with your friends and family at times when distance or other circumstances make seeing each other in-person impossible.
GOOGLE DUO GROUP CALL INSTALL
Google Duo is very easy to install and use. Its natural habitat may be Android, but Google Duo works just as well on iOS or on the web. As opposed to Apple FaceTime, a service that only lives on Apple products, Google Duo can be used on almost any device.
