Customise your background in Google Meet
Google Meet lets you blur or replace your background on video calls. Here's why it's worth turning on to keep your home life private on work calls.
· Updated · 2 min read
Google recently announced a new Google Workspace feature that lets you customise your background during video calls in Google Meet.
Of course, the novelty wears off quickly (but not before you’ve seen yourself in a field of Labrador puppies, or floating somewhere in the Fox Fur Nebula). After that, you’ll begin to appreciate the most important aspect of this feature: personal privacy.
The Covid-19 pandemic brought a dramatic increase in video conferencing. We’ve all embraced the technology, not only to stay in touch with loved ones and keep a small part of “normal” life, human interaction, but, more importantly, to get work done.
Video conferencing tools and the high-bandwidth interaction they enable are great, but they come at the cost of inviting others into your home. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but after the 100th video call, you realise you’re inviting complete strangers into your private living space, warts and all.
Maybe you don’t have a home office and have no choice but to take calls in the living room or bedroom. Or maybe you prefer the garden or balcony, or somewhere you can keep an eye on your napping toddler.
On the other side of the call, you and your surroundings are flattened into a single, two-dimensional image, and the background gets as much visual attention as you do. You may become an unwitting participant in a Big Brother show or, worse, the star of a new YouTube or Instagram meme.
News anchors might get away with broadcasting in boxers and a smart dress shirt, but dirty dishes in the background won’t do anything for your professional image.
In the words of Edward Snowden, “arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.”
We recommend turning on your video background filter by default. It plays an essential role in shielding your private life from your professional life. Even though the boundaries between the two may blur at times, especially now that so many of us work from home, we must stay mindful and keep our personal lives personal. We all deserve the freedom and ability to control our filters.
Custom backgrounds are available to all Google Meet users without installing or configuring special software. All you need is a web browser (we recommend Chrome).
The feature is available on these Google Workspace editions: Essentials, Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education, Enterprise for Education and Nonprofits, as well as to users with personal Google accounts.
