Immersive View

You can now place up to 25 participants on a single virtual background – creating the atmosphere of the class or conference room. The host is able to adjust the arrangements for the participants as necessary. Participants are automatically placed on pre-existing scenes. If the host wants to create a unique scene, they may also use a custom background of their own design. The Virtual Background feature is not required to perform this task, but it does work better if everyone has this functionality.

If this feature is used in a webinar, the host and panelists will appear together on the virtual backdrop while the audience views the scene from outside the conference room.

The Zoom desktop client, mobile app, and Zoom Rooms that do not support Immersive View display information about other participants in either Speaker View or Gallery View (whichever was used before Immersive View was introduced). The participants appear in black color on a black background if the proprietary Zoom desktop client, mobile app, or Zoom Rooms are not supporting Immersive View. If you participate in the Immersive View, you will be able to see these attendees in their original setting, whether they have a virtual background or not. Participants that are placed on the scene that do not meet the Virtual Background system requirements are displayed with a circular frame around them while their video profile images are displayed as a ring around them.

The Immersive View is terminated when screen sharing is performed and replaced by the shared screen. If you stop sharing, you will find that the Immersive View returns to the same positions as before.

As of right now, only local recordings of Immersive Views are supported. If you choose Immersive View, you will only be able to see the immersive scene at the time of viewing, not the thumbnails of other videos. Recordings on the cloud will either be displayed as a Gallery layout or a Speaker layout, depending on the recording settings on the cloud.

Prerequisites

• A desktop version of Zoom is available for download here
  • Windows version 5.6.3 or higher
  • macOS version 5.6.3 or higher
• Download Zoom for mobile
  • Android version 5.6.3 or higher
  • iOS version 5.6.3 or higher
• For macOS: OS version 10.13.3 (High Sierra) and above

Note: Immersive View can also be used by mobile apps, but the user will need to start it on their desktop client in order for it to work.

Allowing Immersive View to be enabled

Note: All other types of accounts are disabled by default. The setting is enabled by default for Free accounts and individual Pro accounts.

Account

All users in your account can use Immersive View by following the steps below.

1. To make changes to your Zoom account settings, you must be logged in as an administrator with permission to make changes.
2. Click on the Account Management option, then click on Account Settings, respectively.
3. The Immersive View option can be found in the In Meeting (Advanced) section of the Meeting tab. Make sure that the setting is enabled.
   Note: When a setting is disabled, it needs to be enabled by clicking on the toggle. When a confirmation dialog appears, select Turn On to verify that the change has been made.
4. The lock icon , which appears if you wish to make this setting mandatory for all users in your account, can be clicked if you wish. Once you have confirmed the setting, click Lock to confirm the setting.

Group

For the entire group of members to have Immersive View enabled, you must do the following:

1. If you are an administrator who has permissions to edit user groups on the Zoom web portal, you can log in there.
2. Then click User Management on the left hand side and then click Groups.
3. Then you can access Settings by clicking the Meeting tab next to the name of the group.
4. The Immersive View option is found under the In Meeting (Advanced) section of the Meeting tab. Make sure that the setting is enabled there.
   Notes:
   • For those settings that are disabled, you can enable them by clicking the Status toggle. You may be prompted to verify the change by choosing Turn On in the dialog box that appears.
   • There is a possibility that the setting is grayed out if it has been restricted at the account level. To change it, the setting should be altered at that level.
5. The lock icon can be clicked if you want to make this setting mandatory for all users in this group, and then once you have confirmed the lock icon, click it to confirm the setting.

User

For your own use, you can enable Immersive View by following these steps:

1. Log on to the Zoom web portal by using your email address and password.
2. Then, click on the Settings link in the navigation panel.
3. The Immersive View option is located in the meeting tab under the In Meeting (Advanced) section. Make sure the setting is enabled in this section.
   Notes:
   • If the setting is disabled, you will need to toggle the Status option in order to enable it. When the verification dialog appears, please select Turn On in order to confirm the change.
   • If the setting is greyed out, it has been locked, therefore it cannot be changed unless it is done at the account level.

Getting started with Immersive View

1. Become the host of a meeting or a webinar.
2. You can do this by clicking the View button in the top-right corner.
3. Choose Immersive from the drop-down menu.
4. To place participants within the scene, you can choose one of the following options:
   • Automatically: By choosing this option, the number of participants within the scene will be maximized. The number of participants within the scene can be changed throughout the immersive scenario.
   • Manually: The number of participants can be added or removed as needed. Adding more images to a particular scene than those that can be included will result in the extra images being removed from the scene.
5. You can choose the scene you want to use from the scene listing. Each scene specifies the maximum number of attendees that can be accommodated.
6. To start the immersion, click the start button.

Viewing Immersive Views in a Different Way

1. Click the View button in the top-right corner of the window.
2. Choose the Immersive View that you wish to use.
3. Once you have chosen a scene, you will need to check the participant assignments.
4. Once you have launched the scene, click on Start.

An Immersive View can be used to create a custom user experience

There is also the option of uploading a custom scene if the standard set of scenes does not meet your needs. A custom scene does not have predefined spaces, so participants will need to be manually placed by the host, since there are no predefined spaces. As for best results, custom backgrounds need to match the file type and resolution of virtual background images for the best results.

1. Click the View button in the top-right corner of the page.
2. Select Immersive View and click Change.
3. Now you can upload your own background.
4. Locate and select the image you want to use in the file selection dialog box.
5. Then click Open.
6. A new scene will now be launched once you click Start.
7. In order to include participant videos on the screen, simply click and drag them onto the scene, adjusting their size if necessary.

The process of moving and adjusting participants

In order to achieve the immersive view, a large number of participants’/panelist’s videos (or fewer) will be automatically displayed in predefined locations when the immersive view begins.

It is necessary to place extra participants above the immersive scene when predefined locations are filled, all the participants are not picked for the scene, or late attendees are present. These videos can be left above the scene by the hosts, or they can click and drag the video down to an empty location, or they can click and drag the video for someone else to replace. Whenever a video is dropped near a predetermined location, it will snap to that location and will be sized to fit that scene.

To resize a video:

1. If you click on a video participant, you will see a thin, blue box that details the video panel that they are participating in.
   
2. By clicking and dragging the participant to where you want, you can change their position in the scene.
3. You can resize their video by clicking on one of the corners of the box and dragging it.

The End of Immersive View

1. Click on the View button at the top-right corner of the screen.
2. From there, you can choose one of the available video layouts, such as Speaker or Gallery.
3. If you would like Immersive View to end, click Stop.
4. In order to prevent the confirmation window from appearing again in the future, you can select Don’t ask me again.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is immersive Zoom?