Pairing up in an office takes 30 seconds. Doing it remotely takes 30 minutes and a calendar invite that makes engineers angry.
If you're looking for a more natural way to pair program remotely, you're in the right place. In this post, we'll cover:
What remote pair programming looks like without a virtual office
How pair programming works in Gather step by step
Why engineering teams choose Gather for code review and collaboration
How to get your team started
The state of remote pair programming (without a virtual office)
In an office setting, it’s easy to pair up. You look around the room, find someone who’s free, and walk over to their desk or wave them over to yours.
In a remote setting, pairing up is a lot more rigid. You probably start with a chat message (“Hey, are you free for 5 minutes?”), and then wait for a response. (And maybe repeat this a few times to different people to see who responds the fastest.) When someone finally replies, you open their calendar to schedule a meeting (typically a 30-minute block, even though it’s only a 5-minute question). Then you wait for the meeting time to come around so you can finally pair up.
When remote teams operate that slowly, it’s no wonder some implement RTO mandates.
Most remote collaboration tools are built for meetings. Gather is built for the moments in between. In a virtual office, pairing up mimics the in-person experience. You look around, find someone who’s free, and either walk over to their virtual desk or wave them over to yours. This brings back the speed and naturalness of pairing up in person without sacrificing the flexibility of remote work.
An example of a quick conversation in a Gather virtual office. Cameron and Natasha never scheduled a meeting; he simply walked over to her desk. This shows the conversation in Office View, but they could also switch to Meeting View to focus on the shared screen.
How Does Remote Pair Programming Work in Gather?
With a virtual office on Gather, you can start pair programming in seconds. All it takes is three steps:
Look around your Gather office
Wave at someone who's free
Unmute to start talking
Let’s say you’re a platform engineer investigating an incident that was just reported. You think you’ve identified the cause, but want to consult a tech lead before rolling back.
Instead of messing with calendar events or messaging a bunch of people and patiently hoping for a quick response, you can check your Gather office, Wave at someone who’s free, and start a conversation in seconds.
Imagine the following image is your engineering team in Gather. At a glance, you can see that Ashley is Busy 🎧, Som is available 🟢 , and Joao and Maxime are already paired up.
To get Som's attention, you can Wave. It’s a fast way to start a conversation that doesn’t require typing the “Hey are you free for 5 minutes to dig into…” message. Skip the typing, send the Wave, and pair up in seconds.
When your teammate approaches you, simply turn on your microphone and camera to start talking. While you troubleshoot, you can share screens simultaneously, making it easy to switch between the incident report and the fix.
The rest of your team will be able to see the two of you paired up, and they could even walk over to help resolve the incident. When it's done, someone might even throw confetti or ring the gong – quick ways to celebrate together.
An impromptu collaboration like this took place in Beatport’s Gather office, and according to Director of Engineering Morgan Soley, the conversation saved their engineering team two weeks of work.
Morgan saw two engineers paired up and walked over to say hi. They were debating how to solve a problem, proposing ideas that would take at least two weeks of work. Morgan offered an alternative solution (a third-party provider the team uses), which neither team member had context for.
Thanks to this completely unplanned pair-up, they got unblocked and prevented two weeks of work on the wrong thing.
A screenshot of Beatport's original Gather 1.0 office, where they created a dedicated paired programming area.
Why Do Engineering Teams Pair Program in a Virtual Office?
Gather is already being called one of the most interesting tools for work communication in 2025, and engineering teams are a big reason why.
A virtual office offers a variety of benefits, including increased employee engagement and a greater sense of connection to teammates. Regarding collaboration, however, engineering teams choose Gather for three main reasons: flexibility, speed, and efficiency.
1. Flexibility: It’s easy to pair up and walk in/out of conversations
Virtual meetings on Gather are much more fluid and flexible compared to traditional video calls. Consider this scenario:
Two engineers can pair up. A third can see them and walk over. They can Wave a designer over if they have questions about a mockup. Once they have clarity, the designer can walk away and let the engineers keep working.
These interactions happen naturally in a single place without messing with meeting links or filling up people’s calendars.
Intuition Systems is the perfect example of this fast-paced, remote engineering team collaboration. Leading up to the beta launch of their app, their engineers sat together at a table in their Gather office. If anyone had a question, they just had to unmute. This made it instant to find someone to pair up with, allowing them to troubleshoot in real time and stay 100% aligned before launch.
"I’ve always loved the energy and focus of a war room during crunch time—it’s where the magic happens. Gather has given us the ability to recreate that intense, collaborative environment remotely, which is absolutely invaluable."
Billy Luedtke, CEO of Intuition Systems
2. Speed: Conversations are quicker than 30-minute meetings
The flexibility of conversations in Gather means engineers can easily pair up without the hassle of formal meetings. This leads to shorter, more productive conversations.
The average conversation on Gather lasts less than 10 minutes. In contrast, Flowtrace's analysis of 1.3 million meetings in modern workplaces showed an average duration of 30 minutes. Remote engineering teams using Gather are more likely to hold short, impromptu meetings instead of scheduling long, formal reviews.
One user on G2 reported that using Gather reduced their remote code review time from 2+ days to under 1. The transparency of conversations, plus the freedom to join or leave at any time, increased the frequency of their pairing sessions, ultimately allowing them to release to production faster.
Example of a conversation in Gather where the shared screen is full-size.
3. Efficiency: Multiple people can share screens at the same time
When you pair up on Gather, multiple people can share their screens simultaneously, making it easy to switch between them.
From G2 | What do you like best about Gather?
Screen sharing for code pairing or demo presentations works great! For someone who believes remote work is superior for both productivity and work-life balance, Gather is the perfect tool to make that work style shine.
Daniel L. Software Developer
In addition to simultaneous screen sharing, you can record meetings, review summaries, and send chat messages for side conversations or to share files. There are even interactive whiteboards for quick sketching or note-taking.
These productivity features, combined with the flexibility of pairing up, make virtual pair programming easy and natural on Gather.
FAQs
What is remote pair programming?
Remote pair programming is a common form of collaboration in which two (or more) engineers pair up to write and review code. This helps them debug in real time, mentor junior developers, and ship releases faster. Unlike in-person pair programming, remote pair programming requires a virtual meeting tool. For a more natural experience, remote teams use a virtual office like Gather so engineers can pair up without scheduling meetings.
What tools do remote engineers use for pair programming?
Remote engineers use Gather to create a virtual office where pairing up is as easy and natural as walking over to someone's desk. Other tools may include Slack (for async reviews), or Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or Google Meet (as traditional virtual meeting tools).
How do you conduct a remote code review without a meeting?
Gather gives your remote engineering team a virtual office where you can see who's actually free and start reviewing code instantly, instead of scheduling a meeting and waiting. The rest of the team can see when engineers are paired up, making it easy to join or know when to let people work.
Try Pair Programming on Gather
If you want your engineers to pair up as fast as they would in person, Gather gives them a virtual office where that's actually possible. Get started with a free 30-day trial. This gives your team time to try pairing up, working through an incident, or running a sprint while working in Gather.
Need help getting started? Follow our Pilot Guide for our best advice on onboarding your team.
