Zoom, go ahead; tell Snapchat, Google Duo is adding more new features to its product to better compete in the exploding video calling and video conferencing space

Group video calls have become a necessity in this age of craze, whether for work meetings or keeping in touch with family and friends, and Zoom, thanks to its grid-like gallery view, has seen its user base soar and become almost ubiquitous However, other services are taking a backseat to Zoom, and Google Duo wants to be one of them To that end, it is adding the ability to make group video calls over the web and a family mode with doodles and special effects

These new features come on top of a major upgrade to Google Duo a few weeks ago, which introduced snapshot and new video codec technology to improve call quality and reliability The company recently increased the maximum number of participants in a group call to 12 and promised to increase it further to 32 in the coming weeks

Soon, group calls, previously limited to the iOS and Android apps, will be supported by Duo on the web The new feature will begin as a preview in Chrome In addition, hosts will be able to send group call links to anyone with a Google account

There is also a new layout that allows group members to be viewed in a grid of six squares, with a scrollable carousel of faces

Family mode allows users to draw on the screen in real time and add Snapchat-like filters; Humberto Castaneda, a product manager at Google Duo, wrote in a blog post about family mode, " You can doodle during a video call for everyone to see, or surprise everyone with fun effects and masks that turn you into an astronaut, a cat, and more," he explained The first filters will be rolled out in time for Mother's Day this weekend

The addition of a family mode with fun filters may help Google Duo stand out from its sibling Google Meet