[hocuspocus]

I don't really see the need to use headphones. Almost nobody in my team does, and we were already working from home ~50% of the time before the current situation.

Despite all the bad things I want to say about the Macbook Pro provided by my employer, its speakers and mic do a pretty good job during videochat.

[zwayhowder]

The problem is the microphone is too good. I just bought my entire team headsets because I'm sick of the background noise from other rooms or in one case his next door neighbour coming over the macbook microphone. Also it stops people shouting which my experience is most people do when on speakerphone, despite the fact that they have never needed to.

It would be fine if your team is used to this and understands mute buttons and whatnot. Not fine when its an employee who doesn't mute and types at 100wpm on the same macbook.

[hocuspocus]

We understand mute buttons. :)

And there shouldn't be a lot of typing involved unless I'm in a 1:1 pair debugging/troubleshooting session, and even then it's not exactly reaching 100 wpm.

I can't say I've been bothered much by background noise, that's actually more often an issue in the office. In the following weeks there will probably be more of it due to kids being home, but we have no choice here.

[biomcgary]

I purchased USB speakerphones for my team. It eliminates echo without requiring headphones.