Slack is one of the best team collaboration and communication tools used by millions of users every day. It has a myriad of features such as unlimited messages and history, sharing various types of files, direct and group calling, and so on. One of the most anticipated features that have made it to the paid version of Slack is screen sharing. Here’s a quick guide on Slack’s Screen Sharing feature, How To Share Your Screen, and all that you need to know.
Here’s an effortless way to share your screen in Slack. Note that sharing your screen works on apps for Windows and Mac OS and thus, the browser-based Slack client won’t allow sharing the screen.
Step #1: First up, open the Slack app on your Windows or Mac computer.
Step #2: Next, select the channel where you want to share your screen within a channel (group). OR select the recipient under Direct Message to share the screen to a respective user only.
Step #3: Tap on the “details icons” on the right side and select “Call” if it’s a channel. OR you can tap on the “Phone” icon in a DM to commence a video call.
Step #4: Slack starts an audio call by default which means, users will have to switch on “camera” for a video feed both from caller and recipient (s). Tap on the “Video Camera” icon to turn it on.
Step #5: If you are a presenter and want to share your screen with others, tap on the “Share your screen” button popping up on the screen. It will be adjoining to the “Mic”, “Video”, “Cut”, “Emoji” and other options.
Things You Need To Know About Sharing Screen On Slack
Presenter & Viewer
Assuming that you are the presenter who wants to share his/her screen with others (i.e. viewers), you can select whether to share the entire screen. You can also share a window of any application such as Microsoft Excel or PowerPoint to name a few. No other user will be able to share their screens whilst one is already sharing the screen and the presenter is an active speaker here.
This means others can speak but there won’t be any video feed except the one shared by the presenter. In context, Zoom allows sharing screen as well as a video feed of each participant in a different window.
One at a Time
For now, Slack supports sharing screens one at a time irrespective of the number of viewers. If a viewer wants to show his/her screen during a presentation, the presenter will have to disconnect sharing screen to allow the viewer to become a presenter.
Ability To Annotate
The presenter can annotate on the screen he/she is sharing which makes it easier to bring things to attention. Use the “Pencil” icon to draw on the screen. Plus, Slack now supports the ability to allow others to annotate the shared screen assuming that the presenter has enabled “group drawing” that he/she can turn off at will.
Allowing others to annotate works in full-screen sharing and thus, drawing when sharing an application window won’t work. Additionally, this works on Windows and Mac PC clients only. There are some limitations when annotating yourself or letting others draw on the screen.
Availability
Slack is available in four models i.e. Free, which is free to use although with certain limitations. The first paid model is Standard followed by Plus and Enterprise Grid in ascending order of features, accessibility, and pricing. The screen sharing feature on Slack is available across Standard, Plus, and Enterprise Grid only. Thus, there’s no screen sharing feature on free subscriptions. Also, it is available for both guests and members.
With this, we conclude our guide on screen sharing, how to share screen on Slack, and plenty of information about it. Let us know if we missed something so that we can add it here.