While the work from home push and a lack of in-person socializing created a culture obsessed with other people’s rooms, 2022 found Zoom users further embracing virtual backgrounds.
While Zoom has had some variation on virtual backgrounds since 2016, it’s steadily added features like support for video backgrounds and slideshow backgrounds, and last year rolled out support for automatic background blurring. (Competitors like Google Meet and Microsoft Teams also have similar features.) This month, a Zoom customer survey revealed that while 55% of users still prefer to show their real-world environs, 26% prefer virtual backgrounds, with another 19% opting for the blur feature.
The rise of the virtual background is giving users license to join meetings from places beyond the traditional or home office, with the survey finding 43% of respondents reported Zooming in the car (hopefully while parked), 25% joining meetings from bed, 19% from coffee shops, and 18% connecting from airports. That likely means meetings are a bit less disruptive for workers, who are able to connect from whatever environments they’re already working (or traveling or napping) in without distracting colleagues with their unusual surroundings.
Previous iterations of Zoom’s surveys asked slightly different questions, so the company doesn’t have data on how various numbers have changed over time, but San Francisco professional image consultant Shelley Golden, who has created custom virtual backgrounds for clients, says demand for such images appears to be on the rise. In addition to hiding a messy or distracting environment, which can actually be more of an issue as workers have returned to open plan offices where coworkers pass by, virtual backgrounds provide an opportunity for branding, similar to the logo-emblazoned backdrops familiar from TV press conferences. That’s likely not such a big deal for internal meetings, but it can add an extra layer of professionalism for calls with clients, vendors, and others outside the organization.
“Because of the need for being more professional, more polished, more branding for your company, for your business, for your organization, there are more virtual backgrounds that are being created,” Golden says. “It helps you look more credible, trustworthy.”
Golden typically designs virtual backgrounds to look realistic—like a “room without distractions”—often with subtle lines directing viewers to the speaker’s face. For those without the artistic bent or budget to design or commission their own custom backgrounds, a wide range of inoffensive backgrounds are available online, including through lists curated by chat software companies like Zoom and Microsoft.
In addition to standard coffee shop scenes and images of impressionist artwork, more adventurous meeting-goers can choose from settings like football fields or scenes from TV shows and movies. Teams even offers a set of “Microsoft nostalgia” Teams backgrounds that include the rolling hills of the Windows XP desktop, the cascading cards of the Windows Solitaire victory screen, and what appears to be the much-maligned vintage Office icon Clippy lurking in a stairwell.
All that suggests that it is indeed possible to put as much effort into crafting or choosing a virtual background as organizing the perfect real-world backdrop—and that there’s a digital equivalent of being the coworker with a cringe-inducing level of Disney, Star Wars, or sports memorabilia lining your desk. But choosing a background that suits your taste and company culture means no longer having to make sure to tidy your bookcase or straighten your sofa cushions while rushing to log into a morning meeting, not to mention the freedom to call in from bed or the side of the road without raising eyebrows.
Naturally, your choice of background may depend on your environment, now that pandemic restrictions are mostly a thing of the past, and the nature of your meeting: You might want to ditch the SpongeBob SquarePants background if you’re anticipating a serious or difficult conversation and, as a Zoom spokesperson points out by email, there may still be times when a physical background might be most appropriate. That might hold true if you’re giving a talk using a physical whiteboard or visual aids, or you still want to show off that copy of The Power Broker you’ve got perched on your bookshelf.
“If you’re working remotely from somewhere like a coffee shop, parked car, or airport, you may want to minimize background distractions and opt for a blurred or virtual background,” according to the Zoom spokesperson. “If you’re in the office or classroom, you may want to show off your physical background.”
But the Zoom survey also suggests that if demographic trends hold, even virtual and blurred backgrounds may increasingly become a thing of the past: Zoom found Baby Boomers are the generation most likely to connect with their cameras on; almost two thirds of Gen Z users prefer to keep their cameras turned off altogether.
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