Google rolled out some new features for Meet that have already been announced in August, including the 49-person grid view on Sept. 15. This will be available to all G Suite users with personal Google Accounts. 

Simultaneously seeing people can improve the dynamics of large group classes and meetings as it allows seeing everyone's reactions on the topic of discussion. This creates a much in-person vibe on virtual meetings, which encourages participation among members.

However, this new Google Meet feature that allows you to see 49 people at once is available only on the web, but you need to enable it manually. The "Auto" layout is set at 9, while the "Tiled" shows 16. You can also see yourself as a tile on the call or use a slider to adjust the number of tiles you see, but you would need to reset the slider in each meeting, so you need to customize every time. 

You may see fewer tiles depending on your window size or internet speed as the tiles available will adjust to fit your screen or increase it to maximum when having a large group.

How to activate the 49- person grid view

Admins have no admin control for this feature, while end-users need to activate it. Here is how to activate the tile feature:

1. On the computer, join a video meeting on the computer.
2. Go to Settings
3. Click More in the lower-right corner of the Meet screen and click Change layout.
4. In the Change layout box, choose the layout that you want to use on your computer. See the following for the available layout choices:

• Auto - the system chooses the layout automatically
• Tiled - 16 people appear on the screen when there is no presentation.
• Hover your mouse over the images to see participant's names. 
• Spotlight shows the active speaker, the presentation, or pinned feed in the window. 
• People who join the meeting after it started will show at the bottom of the screen. 
• Presentations appear in a large tile while the most active participants show on the side.
• Sidebar shows the other participants on the side.

Take note that when choosing a new layout, your preference is automatically saved, then you need to click Auto when you want to return it to the default layout. You may also pick a participant's image to pin to your screen, which will only apply to your screen.

Meanwhile, you can also choose to see yourself appear during the meeting, although you will not see yourself when you picked the "Spotlight layout" or chose another participant to pin.

• On the top right corner and hover over your self preview and click the electron button.
• Choose the People panel.

You may also choose to turn off the self-view feature while in a video call. Don't worry, you can still see a small image of yourself in the top right corner of your phone's screen. To switch off the feature, hover over your self preview and click the planet button.

• On the top right corner of your screen, hover over your self preview and click the planet button.
• Click the planet button on the People panel.
• In the video grid, hover over your tile and click the planet button.

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Written by CJ Robles