Microsoft Teams to raise viewable participants to nine

Microsoft will issue an update for its Teams video conferencing and collaboration software by the end of April that bumps up the number call participants that be seen simultaneously to nine.

The number of participants that can be seen at the same time is currently only four, and increasing that figure is a hotly requested feature, with almost 40,000 upvotes in the Teams user feedback forum.

While users welcomed the increase, they still indicated they would like Teams to display everyone in the call, be it five, 10 or 50 participants.

Apple's Group FaceTime is limited to just four viewable speakers out of the maximum 32 that can be on a call at the same time.

Zoom, which has piled on user numbers during the COVID-19 lockdowns around the world, can display up to 49 participants out of 100 on a call.

Google Classic Hangouts displays video of all the maximum 10 call participants, as does its Hangouts Meet which can handle a total of 30 users.