Accessibility in Google Meet

Important: Some features require local provision and won’t be available in all locales.

With Google Meet, Google provides service for a seamless video conference. It’s part of the Google Workspace suite of productivity tools, like Gmail and Google Docs.

For personal and professional communications, you can use Google Meet to conduct:

Virtual meetings
Video calls
Online conferences

It’s available on various devices, like:

Computers
Smartphones
Tablets

You can use Meet with platform accessibility features and tools, such as screen readers. There are several built-in accessibility features in Meet, like:

Captions
Keyboard shortcuts
Video pinning

If you use Google meeting room hardware, you can use spoken feedback and live captions for meetings on:

Google Meet hardware
Chromebox
Chromebase

Learn more about Google meeting room hardware accessibility.

Tip:

For best results, use the latest version of:
- Meet
- Browser
- Operating system
- Assistive technology

Vision

To interact with Google Meet with spoken feedback or braille, use a screen reader to:

Describe Meet elements and content as you navigate.
Perform actions.
Inform you about alerts and notifications.

Additionally, Google Meet has shortcuts to perform actions like:

Mute or unmute the microphone.
Announce who is speaking.
Open panels such as the people panel.

Tip: For more information:

Latest version of these third-party assistive technologies also works with Meet on Chrome on Windows:

Tip: For more information on low vision assistance features available for your computer, refer to the related resource for your platform for:

Screen reader
Screen magnification
Text scaling
Improve visibility of focus and cursor
Screen resolution
Color filter and contrast customization
Reading mode
Select to speak

Hearing

There are several features that Google Meet provides to assist people who need hearing assistance. These include:

Live captions: Displays captions of the speaker so that deaf or hard-of-hearing participants can follow the meeting dialogue.
- If you record a meeting, to embed the captions in the recording, select Record captions.
- Learn how to use live captions in Google Meet.
Transcripts: For participants to review the meeting dialogue as text, turn on transcripts in your meetings. Learn how to use Transcripts with Google Meet.
Pair tiles: Lets the participants pair tiles in a call.
- Example: To show who’s the speaker or interpreter, a participant and their sign language interpreter can use ”Pair tiles.”
- Learn more about Pair tiles in Google Meet.

Tip: For more information on how to route platform audio to hearing aids, refer to the related resources.

Alternative input

Users with motor disorders or dexterity impairments can benefit from various platform features, like:

Add a physical keyboard with:
- Sticky keys
- Filter keys
- Bounce keys
An on-screen keyboard, optionally with a switch device
Mouse keys
Eye or face tracking for mouse input
Voice input for:
- Command
- Control
- Dictation

Tip: To learn more about these features, refer to the related resources for your platform.

There are many useful shortcuts that you can use with these features in Meet. For example, you can use the shortcuts to:

Mute or unmute the microphone
Turn the camera on or off
Show panels like, ”People” and ”Announce info”

Tips:

For a list of shortcuts, visit Use Meet keyboard shortcuts.
Instead of using the keyboard or mouse, you can raise your hand or show your palm to the camera. Learn more about raise your hand in Google Meet.
Alternatively, to mute or unmute the microphone, turn on “Push to talk.” When turned on:
- To unmute, press and hold the Spacebar.
- To mute again, release the Spacebar.

This feature is off by default in your audio settings and sometimes it won’t work for Windows users who use their screen reader. In this situation, the ”Spacebar” performs a different action.

Voice

You can use a group chat function in Meet. This lets users interact and share reactions without their voice.

If you use an electrolarynx, we recommend you turn off noise cancellation in Meet.

Cognition

If you need multiple modalities to better understand communication, Google Meet includes several features that can be helpful.

When the organizer attaches the agenda or a copy of presentation material for parallel or offline review, find the attachments in the meeting details panel.
For later review, record a video meeting.
To generate a real-time text representation of speech content, use live captions. You can also automatically translate the generated captions to another language.

If you have processing disorders, distraction issues, or other cognitive challenges, these optional AI features can be helpful:

You can use “Take notes for me:”
- To automatically capture meeting notes in Google Docs and share with your team.
- To catch up with “Summary so far” when you’re in the meeting if you join late.
- As the organizer to receive an email with a link to the recap shortly after the meeting ends.
- Learn how to use "Take notes for me" in Google Meet.
You can use AI to create a transcript and make it available after the meeting for offline review. Learn how to use Transcripts with Google Meet.

If you want to reduce distractions, Google Meet includes several features that can be useful:

Focus your meeting to display only the presentation or hide participants with video feeds that distracts you.
- Other participants aren’t notified or don't experience any changes on their feeds.
- Learn how to turn off the video feed from other participants.
Turn off reaction sounds, reaction animation, or all reactions but your own. Learn how to use Reactions in Google Meet.
Turn off desktop notifications.

You can also use these additional platform features:

Animation toggle
Notification timeout and appearance
Select to speak

Tip: To learn more about these additional features, refer to the related resources.

Accessibility in Google Meet

Vision

Hearing

Alternative input

Voice

Cognition

Related resources

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