Earlier this week we reported that Zoom was starting to cut off its original Chrome OS app, leaving Chromebook owners with a new PWA that unexpectedly pulled Gallery View support for many. Now, we can confirm that Zoom intends to bring this feature back in the coming weeks.
Zoom’s new Progressive Web App for Chrome OS and other platforms enables better support for the videoconferencing app through a web browser, but it came with some downsides compared to the older Chrome app. One of the biggest losses has been the removal of Gallery View on many low-end Chromebooks in Zoom meetings.
The requirement for Zoom’s PWA and Gallery View is tied to the processor, with the machine running the app requiring more than a dual-core processor to support Gallery View. This means that many Chromebooks running Intel Celeron chips lack support for Zoom’s Gallery View entirely when using the PWA. Instead, owners are left with Speaker View only, and a message saying that “Gallery View is not supported on this device.”
Importantly, though, Zoom’s legacy Chrome app did support Gallery View on these machines, leading to confusion and frustration for owners just trying to get on a video call. We’ve seen multiple reports of this locally, and there are quite a few Play Store reviews of the Zoom PWA complaining about this issue. Adding to the frustration, this requirement was not properly documented by Zoom.
In speaking with a Zoom spokesperson, we’ve confirmed that the PWA will restore support for Gallery View on dual-core Chromebooks in “early December.” No specific date was offered, unfortunately, but it’s great to see Zoom committing to restoring this feature.
More on Chromebooks:
- Hands-on: HP Chromebook X2 is pretty close to the ideal Chrome OS tablet, when it’s on sale
- Future Chromebooks may alert you when someone is snooping over your shoulder
- Chromebook shipments plummet 37% in Q3 2021 following pandemic-fueled growth
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