Apple
Sharing your screen during a video call is a great way to show other people on the call exactly what you’re talking about. Whether it’s a document you’ve been working on, or simply showing your grandma how to sign in to Netflix, sharing your screen can make your explanations significantly easier. One downside is that when you’re sharing your screen, you disappear from view, making the call feel less personal and a little detached.
In macOS Sonoma, there’s a new feature that fixes that problem: Presenter Overlay. Here we are diving into everything you need to know about Presenter Overlay, including what it is and how it works? Keep reading to find out.
What is Presenter Overlay in macOS Sonoma?
Presenter Overlay is a new feature that’s part of macOS Sonoma. When you share your screen in a video call, instead of disappearing from view, your webcam will continue to be displayed on the screen. You can then talk people through what you’re sharing with them, without becoming a disembodied voice. It can make presenting the content that you’re sharing feel more personal.
How does Presenter Overlay work?
When you share your screen on a FaceTime call, or using a supported third-party app such as Zoom, you’ll get three options. You can choose to keep Presenter Overlay off, so that you disappear from view and only the content you’re sharing appears on the screen.
If you do want to use Presenter Overlay options, you get two options. Small brings up a bubble containing a live feed of your webcam focused just on your head and shoulders. You can drag the bubble around the screen as you’re discussing different sections of what you’re sharing.
Selecting Large works in reverse; the focus is on you and the stream from your webcam, and the content that you’re sharing appears next to you as a virtual screen that you can move in front of to point out key sections of your shared screen.
How to use Presenter Overlay in macOS Sonoma
As you would expect, Presenter Overlay works seamlessly when you’re making a video call in Apple’s FaceTime video calling app, but it will also work with popular third-party video conferencing apps, such as Zoom.
Using Presenter Overlay in FaceTime
To use Presenter Overlay in FaceTime, you’ll need to be running macOS Sonoma on an Apple Silicon Mac. If you can’t wait to try out this new feature, you can download and install the macOS Sonoma public beta right now.
- Start a FaceTime call.
- At the bottom of the screen, click the Share Screen icon.
- Select the window you want to share or choose your entire screen.
- Under Presenter Overlay, select Small or Large to start using the Presenter Overlay feature.
- To stop using Presenter Overlay, click the Share Screen icon and select Off.
Using Presenter Overlay in Zoom
You can also use Presenter Overlay in third-party apps such as Zoom. Here’s how it works.
- Start a Zoom call.
- At the bottom of the screen, click the Share Screen button.
- Select the window or desktop you want to share and click the Share button.
- You can also quickly share a window by clicking and holding on the green window button and selecting Share on Zoom.
- In the menu bar, click the Share Screen icon.
- Under Presenter Overlay select Small or Large to start the feature.
- If you want to stop using Presenter Overlay, click the Share Screen icon in the menu bar, and under Presenter Overlay, select Off.
Does my Mac support Presenter Overlay?
In order to be able to use Presenter Overlay, you’ll need to be running macOS Sonoma on a Mac that has Apple Silicon inside, such as the M1 or M2 chip. If you’re using an Intel Mac, you won’t be able to use the feature even if you upgrade to macOS Sonoma. That’s because Presenter Overlay uses the Neural Engine in Apple Silicon to work its magic.
The Macs that can use Presenter Overlay are as follows:
- MacBook Pro 2021 or later
- MacBook Pro 13-inch M1 (2020)
- iMac 2021 or later
- Mac mini 2020 or later
- Mac Studio 2022 or later
- Mac Pro 2023 or later