Thanks to Android 14, you can use your phone’s camera as a webcam

Ana sayfa / Android

The phrase “my computer’s camera is broken”, which is always said in online classes, is now history. The latest version of Android brings a brand new feature. Now Android users will be able to connect their cell phone camera to Windows, Mac, Linux or even another Android phone.

This will allow your phone camera to work like a webcam. This fun feature comes with the beta version of Android. Now when you connect an Android phone to a computer, a new option will appear in the USB Preferences menu. Here are the details…

Android beta will turn your phone into a webcam!

With the latest Android beta, you will now be able to use your phone’s camera on your computer. When you connect your Android phone to a computer with a USB cable, you will see the new feature in the USB preferences menu. Simply select this new option instead of the default ‘file transfer’. The phone camera will then register itself as a webcam.

When is this feature coming? The version with this feature is Android 14 QPR1 Beta 1. Android 14 will most likely be released with the Pixel 8 in October. QPR stands for quarterly platform release. This means that this feature will come in December with Android 14 QPR1.

This is actually not the first step for the smartphone world. This feature has been available on iOS for a long time. Technically, Android was inspired by iOS for this feature. Apple calls this feature the Continuity camera. But it only works between iPhone and Mac.

Android will offer this feature as a public USB webcam. In this way, this feature will work in almost any environment such as Windows Mac and Linux. You will even be able to connect an Android phone to another Android phone.

A phone is much thicker than the top half of a laptop. Computer cameras are squeezed into the paper-thin screen. That’s why many phone cameras have better resolution than a laptop camera.

This feature is great, but it doesn’t end there. To use the camera comfortably, we need to position it correctly, and that requires a proper phone mount. Also, the new feature does not bring an update for the microphone. You will need to get an external microphone.