Are you seeing pictures and videos on your Chromecast zoomed-in, displaying widescreen, or cropped off? This article will help you troubleshoot this issue and make Chromecast zoom out.

Why is it zoomed in or cropped off?

You might occasionally see Chromecast videos or even Ambient Mode wallpapers getting cropped off on the screen. Most of the time, this happens because of an incorrect aspect ratio. Here is a list of workarounds that we found while researching for this article.

Before we start, the first thing you should try is restarting both your TV and Chromecast. If that does not fix the issue for you, try one of the following workarounds that we found working for many users on Google’s official forum and Reddit.

Letterboxing

Another issue that you might be able to fix by switching to the correct aspect ratio is Letterboxing.

A 3:2 Chromebook (Pixelbook, Pixel Slate, C302, etc. will display with black edges, on a 16:9 TV, when someone casts the desktop, or tab from a Chromebook.

Change “Overscan” Settings

“Overscan is a behavior in certain television sets, in which part of the input picture is shown outside of the visible bounds of the screen”

Different TV makers might call this with different names. Look for “overscan” or something that sounds similar. If you find overscan IIRC, disable it. In some TVs, it is called 16:9 overscan. 

If your TV has “Just Scan”, use that option.

If you are not able to find overscan settings on your TV, try Googling “overscan + your TV model”. If you have your TV’s manual handy, be sure to refer to that as well. Look for “aspect ratio” or “overscan” here as well.

If you are lucky, you might find this option to change the display mode on the TV remote itself. Keep pressing the aspect ratio button to cycle through all the available options. Stop when you find the right aspect ratio for the Chromecast.

Change TV Zoom Settings

Directly related to the previous issue, zoom setting is how the TV set responds to content that is in the incorrect aspect ratio.

Refer to this article from Remove and Replace for recommendations on how to fix this issue.

Hope you found this article helpful. If you have any followup questions, post them in the comments section.