Gaze for Web

Quick summary

Gaze (also called Gaze: Long Distance Movie Night) is a free, browser-based tool from letsgaze.com that aims to let people watch videos together remotely. It advertises synchronized playback for content from social platforms like YouTube and Facebook, plus built-in video calls and chat so viewers can interact while watching.

How to begin using it

• Paste the video link you want to watch or upload a file from your computer after others have joined the session.
• Visit the letsgaze.com site and click the “Start Gazing” button to create a session.
• Send the generated invitation link to friends via email or Facebook so they can join.
• Instruct participants to paste the invitation URL into their browser’s address bar and press Enter to access the session.

Issues encountered during testing

• The site requests permission to use your microphone and camera, but then displays a prompt stating those devices were not allowed, preventing audiovisual communication.
• The same permission/availability problem appears whether you try a normal session or an instant demo, making the call/chat features unreliable.
• Due to these recurring permission errors, the sync-watching experience is effectively unusable in its current state.

Alternatives worth trying

• Kast — a more mature platform for co-watching that generally offers stable syncing, voice/video chat, and broader feature support.
• Smartcric — another option users sometimes try for streaming and shared viewing, though feature sets vary by service.

Recommendation

Gaze is simple to learn and launch, but because of the persistent device-permission failures, it’s not dependable right now. If you want a consistent co-watching experience, try one of the suggested alternatives until the Gaze developers address the permission and functionality issues.