Google Suite offers free streaming for everyone working from home during the coronavirus outbreak

The coronavirus outbreak has made many people work, teach and study from home. To make this easier, Google Suite is now offering free access to advanced Hangouts Meet video-conferencing. If your work has moved online as well, you can take advantage of this offer no matter where in the world you are.

Hangouts Meet is now available to all G Suite customers around the world, and this is what it offers:

• Larger meetings for up to 250 participants per call
• Live streaming for up to 100K viewers within your domain
• Record meetings to Google Drive to share with those who can’t attend

It’s worth noting that these features are typically only available in the Enterprise edition of G Suite. However, due to the current circumstances, they will be available to all customers until 1 July 2020. G Suite users can also access Google Classroom to join classes, no matter if they are teachers or students.

What does it mean for your business? Well, I believe that you will find it useful no matter what you do. Most of us work with other people, no matter if they’re our coworkers or clients. You can use Hangouts Meet to stay in touch and have meetings with all of them.

Personally, I know many people who have switched to online teaching right now. Most of them are English teachers, but photographers also came to mind. There are many creatives who are also teachers or they organize workshops. I believe that they could find this offer tremendously useful.

If you currently have the G Suite Basic or Business edition, you can access the advanced Hangouts Meet capabilities for free. Here are the steps you need to take:

1. If you haven’t turned on Hangouts Meet for your organization, you must first enable it
2. To enable Hangouts Meet video calls and advanced Meet features for your organization, follow these instructions:
   1. From the Admin console Home page, go to Apps > G Suite > Settings for Google Hangouts
   2. Click Meet Settings
   3. Check the edit icon on the right side of the “Additional Services” box.
   4. Scroll down and check the box that says “Let users place video and voice calls.”
   5. In the same screen, turn on other advanced settings for live streaming and meeting recording.
   6. Click Save

As I mentioned, the offer is valid until 1 July 2020. If you’d like to read more and learn more details, visit Google Cloud Blog.