Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Google is working on a new Video Chat panel for Android that lets you apply a variety of visual and audio effects to video calls.
- These effects include background blur, portrait lighting, portrait touch-up, and studio-style mic processing.
- Although we spotted evidence of the Video Chat panel in Android 16 Beta 4, the feature doesn’t work yet, suggesting it’ll roll out in a future release.
If you want to look your best on a video call, you’ll need a great camera, adequate lighting, and a decent background. However, many people don’t have an ideal setup for video calls, or they’re simply not in a great location to take them. That’s why the best video chat apps provide various effects to help improve your video or audio quality. The exact effects available depend on the platform, though; some apps may lack certain effects or implement them in ways that can tax the device’s processor. To address this inconsistency and potential performance hit, Google is developing a system-wide Video Chat panel for Android that will let you apply effects to any video call.
You’re reading an Authority Insights story. Discover Authority Insights for more exclusive reports, app teardowns, leaks, and in-depth tech coverage you won’t find anywhere else.
While digging through the fourth beta of Android 16, I discovered strings for a new Quick Settings tile called “Video Chat.” The strings show that Android will support effects like background blur (which blurs your background environment), portrait relighting (which improves the lighting on your face), portrait touch-up (which retouches your face to remove imperfections), and studio-style mic (which suppresses background noise). For background blur, you’ll have the option to apply a light blur or a full blur to the background. The portrait relighting, portrait touch-up, and studio-style mic effects are simple on/off toggles.
Code
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_label">Video chat</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_dialog_title">Video chat effects</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_portrait_relight_label">Improve lighting</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_background_full_blur_option">Full Blur</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_background_label">Background</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_background_light_blur_option">Light Blur</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_background_off_option">Off</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_face_retouch_label">Portrait touch-up</string>
<string name="qs_desktop_effects_studio_mic_label">Studio-style mic</string>Here’s what Android’s new Video Chat panel looks like in Android 16 Beta 4:
Unfortunately, none of the effects currently work on my Pixel phone. I launched a Google Meet call and then enabled the effects, but nothing changed in my video feed. This feature likely relies on the vendor—in this case, Google—providing specific software libraries for each effect. Alternatively, the Video Chat panel might simply not be hooked up to the underlying camera framework in Beta 4 yet.
In any case, we expect these effects to work in any video chat app, as there would otherwise be little point in creating a dedicated Quick Settings panel for them. Applying effects system-wide is common practice on other platforms, so it wouldn’t be surprising for Android to follow suit. Intriguingly, the title of each string starts with “qs_desktop_effects,” suggesting this feature could tie into Google’s ongoing efforts to enhance Android’s desktop capabilities. This connection makes sense, as desktop operating systems like Windows and macOS already offer similar built-in video effect features.
