A webcam that makes you look dark or washed out can usually be fixed without extra software. Windows 11 has a camera page with a brightness slider, but it only shows controls your camera actually offers. Meeting apps also keep their own video settings, so this guide covers both places.
Change brightness from the Cameras page
The values you set here become the defaults for that camera on your account. They do not sync to other PCs.
- Select Start, then open Settings.
- Go to Bluetooth & devices and then Cameras.
- Under Connected cameras, select your webcam.
- Windows opens the camera and shows a live preview, with controls for the image.
- Drag the Brightness slider until the preview looks right. Adjust Contrast the same way if the image still looks flat.
- Close Settings. Each change is saved as soon as you make it.
Other controls on the same page
The page may also offer Saturation, Sharpness, Rotation for external cameras mounted a different way, Video HDR to balance bright and dark areas, and Windows Studio Effects on supported hardware. What you see depends on the camera and your Windows version. Some apps ignore these defaults and apply their own settings once they start the camera, so a change here does not always carry into every program.
When the brightness slider is missing
A control appears only when the camera and its driver offer it, so a missing slider usually means the camera cannot be adjusted from Windows. The same is true on Windows 10: when the Cameras page has no brightness or contrast sliders, the camera does not support changing them. If no camera is listed at all, the camera fixes come first.
- Some cameras are not listed on the page at all. That covers the infrared camera behind Windows Hello face sign-in, DSLR or action cameras used as webcams, and many industrial or network cameras.
- If your camera maker offers its own app, look for a button under Related settings on the camera page. It opens that app, which may have extra controls.
Why the picture brightens or darkens by itself
Some laptop cameras, Dell's among them, start dark or bright and then settle after a moment. This comes from automatic exposure and automatic white balance, which keep adjusting to the light in the room. It happens each time an app starts the camera and after waking from hibernation. These functions are part of the camera firmware and cannot be turned off. If the settled image is still too dark, raise the Brightness slider in Settings.
Adjust brightness inside Teams and Zoom
Meeting apps have their own video controls, so check the app you are using for calls.
- Microsoft Teams: select Settings and more next to your profile picture, then Settings, Devices and Camera. Depending on your account, hardware and app version, you may see Adjust brightness, Soft focus and Automatically adjust camera controls. Before joining a meeting you can also use Open device settings and the video settings.
- Zoom: open the desktop app while signed in, click your profile picture, then go to Settings and Video & effects. On Zoom 6.7.0 or newer, the gear icon in the navigation bar leads to the same Video & effects page.
- Google Meet: visit meet.google.com in your browser, then choose Settings followed by Video to pick your camera.