Manage Participants in Zoom

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How to Minimize Disruptions in Zoom

Teaching via web conference can be a great way to reach your students and simulate a face-to-face environment. However, there is a potential for unnecessary noise coming in over microphones that your students may not realize they are broadcasting. You WANT your students to use their microphones and talk to you, just not all at once. As the instructor and meeting host, you have some muting controls that can help with the potential disruptions.

  • Mute on Entry will automatically mute participants as they join the meeting.
  • Mute All can be used during the session if there are noises that shouldn't be heard and you need to mute it quickly.
  • Remove microphone privileges and ask students to use the hand raise feature. you can unmute individual students as you "call" on them.
Note: If you are teaching a Connect course, meeting settings should not be changed. Instead, manage open mics within the call itself on a separate device or ask your classroom facilitator to help.

Mute on Entry

When scheduling a meeting, the option to Mute participants upon entry is at the bottom of the page. You can also turn this feature on from within the call itself by following these instructions:

1

In the meeting, click on the Participants button

participants button

 
2

Click on More, then click on Mute Participants upon Entry to enable

participants menu with more drop-down menu open and a checkmark next to mute participants on entry, allow participants to unmute themselves, allow participatns to rename themselves, and enable waiting room

 
3

As students enter the meeting room, their microphones will be muted and they will have the option to unmute themselves

Mute All

Note: If you are teaching a Connect course, Mute All should not be used because it will take away the classroom equipment's ability to unmute. Instead, mute participants individually (more info below).

1

While in the meeting, click on the Participants button

participants button

 
2

Click on the Mute All button

bottom of participant panel with Invite button, Mute All button, and more dropdown. Mute All button is highlighted.

 
3

A pop-up window will appear, click Mute ALL

  • At this point, you have the option to Allow participants to unmute themselves by clicking on the checkbox

Mute all current and new participants with option to allow participants to unmute themselves unchecked and the mute all button highlighted

Mute One Participant

Instead of muting all participants, you can manually mute one or more participants manually. Open the Participants panel and hover over the person's name. You can then select the Mute button. 

Raise Hands

Ask participants to use the Raise Hand option when they are ready to talk or call on them to talk by locating their name on the participant list, hovering over the name, and clicking on the Ask to Unmute button

Participant name with ask to unmute button highlighted

The student will receive a pop-up message asking to unmute and the student will need to press Unmute

The host would like you to unmute with options to stay muted or unmute. Unmute is highlighted.

Note: When scheduling a meeting, there is an option to Request permission to unmute participants. If selected, participants will get a notification at the beginning of the meeting asking if they want to allow the host to unmute them. If they approve that notification, the host can unmute participants directly instead of “asking” them to unmute and waiting for them to unmute their microphone. If applied to a recurring meeting, participants will only need to grant access once.

Remove Microphone Privileges

1

In the meeting, click on the Security button

Security button within a Zoom call.

 
2

Click on Unmute Themselves to retract that access from participants

Security option to allow participants to unmute themselves.

 
3

You will now need to request that participants unmute themselves or manually unmute them (depending on your meeting settings—see above) or have them use the text chat for communication

Note: The option to remove participants' access to their mics can also be found by clicking on the Participants button and selecting the "..." button at the bottom.

Meeting Capacity

For the USU license of Zoom, meeting participant capacity is 300.