I don’t really like Zoom, but I was on a call the other day with 3 other people calling from phones and iPads, all using virtual backgrounds. You don’t need beefy specs to use the feature.
Probably the other poster meant it requires a lot of CPU for you to have a virtual background, not for other people.
It wouldn't make sense for other people using the feature to take any more processing power--I assume the video is encoded and processed the same either way.
I think the OP meant that people using iPad and iPhone to call in also had virtual backgrounds, so concluded that it might not need as much CPU as the GP surmised.
Another poster mentioned though that Zoom required green screens for this feature on non-intel CPU machines.
