Qualitative research needed to adapt to the virtual format to avoid interruptions due to the need for social isolation from the COVID pandemic.The objective was to present the perception of participants in virtual focus groups regarding difficulties,disadvantages,advantages, and suggestions for improving future VFG. It is a descriptive qualitative research with data collected in 4 open questions applied by electronic questionnaire within three virtual focus groups conducted with the Microsoft Teams tool,lasting approximately 2 hours each, and having 4 to 5 participants per group. Thematic categorical content analysis was carried out.The sample consisted of 13 professionals working in the thematic area of research (innovation in the public sector),being 62.5% male;53.8% with specialization;from two Brazilian states (61.5%-DF/38.5%-ES);69.2% from federal and 30.8% from state organizations.The main difficulties were related to internet connection problems and lack of knowledge of the tool,while 61.5% reported that they had no difficulties.The possible disadvantages listed were: technical problems (internet,energy,audiovisual quality),risk of losing focus on the meeting,duration of the meeting,lack of familiarity with the tool used,loss of dynamism in the group interaction;46.2% inform that there is no disadvantage.The main advantages were related to the participation of people from different cities,lower cost,less time and greater comfort for the participant,use of tools that allow video interaction and use of presentation and recording to record the collected data.The suggestions made by the participants were related to the availability of previous material,limit and profile of participants for VFG,interaction dynamics and use of the Zoom tool that is more familiarized by organizations.The research contributed to identify the challenges and possibilities of using VFG in research,allowing more effective planning and conduction of qualitative virtual collections.