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Product Release Notes

Updated this week

2025

April 2025

  • Raise Hand Feature: We've added a Raise Hand button to the main meeting room for all participants. When someone raises their hand, the room is notified, and they're brought to the stage in the order they raised it. Hosts can also lower hands from the "..." menu on any video card.

  • Full Screen Toggle for Screen Share & Embed Slides
    Participants can now click a new full screen button (bottom-right corner of the activity card) to expand Screen Share videos and Embed Slides presentations. This makes shared content easier to view, especially on smaller screens.

  • Keyboard Navigation for Embed Slides
    You can now use your keyboard’s left and right arrow keys to navigate through slides in Embed Slides activities, making presentations smoother and more accessible.

  • Update to Hosting Permissions: We’ve updated event hosting permissions: only assigned hosts can now start games, manage recordings, mute participants, control stage activities, or play videos. Organizers and Gatheround Admins will now experience events as participants unless they assign themselves as hosts from the participant list.

  • Missing Gatheround Events: We resolved an issue where some event links showed an error until refreshed.

  • Improved Screen Share: Anyone with screen sharing permissions can now share during the Screen Share activity. Multiple participants can share within the same session as well. Great for team demos and collaborative presentations!

  • One activity at a time: We’ve simplified the meeting flow by removing the ability to stack or pin multiple activities. Now, starting a new activity will automatically stop the current one and remove its card from the stage. If you stop an activity early, its card disappears too, bringing the focus back to participant videos.

March 2025

  • Embed Slides
    You can now import a deck directly from your Google Slides account and present it in Gatheround — no need to start a screen share! The following features are also supported:

    • Speaker Notes Support
      Presenters can view their speaker notes while presenting, making it easier to stay on track.

    • Slide Skipping Honored
      Any slides marked as skipped in Google Slides will be automatically skipped in Gatheround too.

    • Collaborative Control
      All hosts can control the slideshow — no more “next slide please” moments.

    • Preview Mode
      See your slide deck right within Gatheround before going live with your group.

    • Renamed Activity
      The old "Presentation" activity is now called Share Screen.

  • AI-Powered Agenda Creation from Slides
    Admins can now upload a Google Slides presentation and use AI to generate a draft agenda in Gatheround. You can choose a high, medium, or low interactivity level, and customize the result as needed.

February 2025

  • Simplified Room Layout & Smarter Stage Sizing

    We’ve removed the concept of multiple layouts. The room now always uses the side-by-side view. The stage automatically adjusts to your browser size, and YouTube videos, screen share, and presentations now expand to fill most of the space. Plus, the show/hide chat button is now always available, no matter the activity.

  • UI Improvements: More Space, Clearer Exits
    We’ve made two updates to improve the main room experience:

    • The room header is now more compact, giving presentations and shared content more room on screen.

    • The Leave Room button in the top-right corner is now red to make it easier to find when you're ready to exit.

January 2025

  • Threaded Replies in Chat
    You can now reply to specific messages in chat to start a thread! Replies stay grouped together so conversations stay organized.

  • Participants Can Now Share Their Screen
    Participants can now start screen sharing — not just hosts! Hosts still have full control and can disable this option in the Host Controls panel.

2024 Recap

  • Our new webinar mode puts the spotlight on facilitators and speakers. Learn more.

    • Plus: Outside of webinar mode, participants will now be represented by an avatar when off-camera — but you can still have up to 200 participants on-camera at once.

  • New event room updates to keep participants engaged:

    • Enhanced noise cancellation is now enabled by default in all events; it can be turned off when you join an event and at any time in device settings.

    • The full range of emoji reactions are available in chat

    • We added chat to breakout rooms and breakout prompt decks now have a card counter.

    • Participant videos are no longer tilted.

  • AI summaries and transcripts. Track event outcomes, gather data, and create an easy-to-find record to keep all your participants on the same page. Learn more.

  • Improved accessibility features. Learn more about accessibility in Gatheround.

    • Closed captioning

    • Best practices for screen reader compatibility

    • Background blur

    • Automated transcription

  • Simplified navigation to events and recaps. It’s now easier than ever to find all of your events in one place. Learn more.

    • Visit the “My Events” tab in your sidebar to view and edit all events for which you’re a host.

    • You can also use the “My Events” tab to view recaps for all past events you attended, whether you were a host or a participant.

  • In case you missed it: Gatheround is now part of Donut 🎉

    • Gatheround was recently acquired by Donut, an innovative employee experience platform used by 20,000+ companies to automate key employee programs. Learn more.

    • In 2025, we’ll add even more new ways to help you run live sessions for all of your programs, from onboarding to manager training to performance management. Schedule time with us to share your feedback and ideas.

July 2024

  • Gatheround has a new look! We've updated your group's page to make it even easier to access past events and recaps. Read more about your group here.

June 2024

  • Launched transcription to help participants catch up on anything they missed in a meeting! Once enabled, transcripts can be viewed in your event recap.

May 2024

  • Introduced annual subscriptions to Gatheround Premium. You can purchase or update your subscription from our pricing page.

  • Increased Photo Booth activity duration to 20 seconds (more time to catch your smiles 😃).

April 2024

  • Launched resources within your group page to help you get started on Gatheround, including an interactive tutorial event to walk you through how to navigate the event as a host on Gatheround.

March 2024

  • All hosts/organizers/admins can now control the YouTube video (previously only the person who played it had control). Play, pause, and seek will be synced to all participants

  • Deployed optimizations to better handle screen sharing and improve call quality when a screenshare is in progress.

  • Added support for markdown in Flash Cards

February 2024

  • Layout will now automatically switch to Presentation mode (previously called Fullscreen layout) when a Presentation activity is played or a screenshare is started.

  • Implemented an update to optimize call quality and improve transitions between main room, breakouts, and photobooth

  • Introducing our new Agenda Builder! Easily access our Activity Library to seamlessly add activities to your event.

  • Default volume for YouTube videos is now set to 50, previously 100, for both hosts and participants.

  • Organizers now have the ability to duplicate individual activities and sections while building an agenda.

  • Participants will now be notified when a host pins a participant on stage

  • Hosts, organizers and admin who host multiple sessions using a single event link can now see each session listed by date on the recap page associated with that event link.

January 2024

  • Recordings in recap pages are now immediately playable!

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