How to make eye contact with your MacBook camera
By Zakaria Reziki · · 8 min read
The MacBook camera sits at the top centre of the display, but you look at the middle of the screen. On current MacBooks that gap is 9–11 cm, or about 10° at a normal distance. To make eye contact, raise the laptop to eye level and put whatever you need to look at in the 2 cm strip directly under the camera.
Where is the camera on a MacBook?
On every MacBook the FaceTime camera is at the top centre of the display. On the MacBook Air with Liquid Retina display and the MacBook Pro with Liquid Retina XDR display, the screen extends up around it, and the camera sits in a cut-out Apple calls the camera housing, usually called the notch. The menu bar wraps around it (Apple Support). On older MacBook models without the notch, the camera is in the black bezel above the screen.
The green light next to the lens tells you when the camera is on. That tiny spot is the target. Everything below it on the screen is further from eye contact than it feels.
How far is the screen from the MacBook camera?
Viewers perceive the strongest eye contact when you look about 2° below the lens (Gao et al., 2025). The full research summary is in where to look on a video call. Here is how far the middle of each current MacBook screen sits from the camera. Heights are calculated from the diagonal and native resolution, so treat them as close estimates.
| Model | Screen height | Centre below camera | Angle at 45 cm | At 55 cm | At 65 cm |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 13.6" MacBook Air | ~18.8 cm | ~9.4 cm | 11.8° | 9.7° | 8.2° |
| 14" MacBook Pro | ~19.6 cm | ~9.8 cm | 12.3° | 10.1° | 8.6° |
| 15.3" MacBook Air | ~21.1 cm | ~10.6 cm | 13.2° | 10.9° | 9.2° |
| 16" MacBook Pro | ~22.3 cm | ~11.2 cm | 13.9° | 11.5° | 9.7° |
Every row is four to seven times the 2° target. The 2° strip itself is only about 1.6 cm tall at 45 cm, 1.9 cm at 55 cm and 2.3 cm at 65 cm. Plug in your own distance with the eye contact calculator.
How to raise your MacBook for better eye contact
With a laptop flat on a desk, the camera usually sits below your eyes and looks up at you. Height fixes the angle of the shot. The notes strip, covered below, fixes where your eyes go.
- Lift the laptop on a stand, a box or books until the camera is level with your eyes or slightly above.
- Set the lid close to vertical. Tilting it back aims the camera upward and shows the ceiling.
- Use an external keyboard and trackpad if you type during calls. A raised laptop is awkward to type on.
- Sit back to 50–70 cm. The table shows how much distance reduces the angle.
- Check the frame in Photo Booth: eyes about a third of the way down, head and shoulders visible.
The external display problem
Many people use a MacBook with its lid open next to a bigger monitor, and look at the monitor all day. The camera is still in the MacBook. That puts it far from everything you look at.
| Layout | Offset from camera | Gaze angle |
|---|---|---|
| MacBook beside the monitor, you look at the monitor centre | ~40 cm sideways at 60 cm | ~34° to the side |
| MacBook in front of and below the monitor | ~25 cm above at 70 cm | ~20° above |
Both are worse than looking down at the MacBook's own screen. Chen's CHI 2002 study found people are an order of magnitude less sensitive to gaze below their eyes than to gaze left, right or above. Sideways and upward misses are the ones viewers notice.
You have two fixes:
- Bring your content to the camera. Keep the monitor for work, but put the call window and your notes at the top of the MacBook screen, under its camera, for the length of the call.
- Bring a camera to the content. Mount an iPhone or a webcam at the top centre of the monitor you actually look at.
Use your iPhone as a webcam with Continuity Camera
Continuity Camera lets a Mac use an iPhone's rear camera as its webcam. Apple lists these requirements (Apple Support):
- macOS Ventura 13 or later, and iOS 16 or later.
- iPhone XR or later.
- Both devices on the same Apple Account with two-factor authentication, near each other, with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on. A USB connection also works.
Mount the phone locked and stable, rear cameras facing you, at the top centre of the display you look at. Apple notes that landscape orientation lets apps pick the iPhone automatically. Otherwise choose the iPhone from the app's camera or video menu. Apple also lists Center Stage, Portrait mode, Studio Light and Desk View as available effects.
The geometry does not change: the phone becomes the new camera, and your notes belong in the strip directly under it.
Put reading material in the strip under the camera
If you read a script or glance at talking points on calls, where they sit matters more than anything else in this guide.
- Keep it high. The current line should sit within 2–3 cm of the lens: the first line under the notch or bezel.
- Keep it narrow. A column about 10 cm wide keeps side-to-side eye movement small, which matters because horizontal movement is what viewers spot.
- Keep it short. Show one or two lines at a time. Every extra line pushes your eyes lower.
- Keep your hands off it. Scrolling with the trackpad sends your eyes down to find your place.
A normal window can do some of this if you drag it up under the menu bar. A teleprompter built for the notch does all of it. Cuey, the teleprompter for Mac, places your script under the camera by default. It can also sit at the notch, left or right of the camera, or float anywhere, which is how you put it under an iPhone on an external monitor. Its Follow mode listens and advances as you speak. The guide to using a teleprompter on Mac walks through setup.
For Zoom-specific window placement and settings, see how to make eye contact on Zoom.