Zoom: Breakout Rooms

This Guide will help you to:

• Create a meeting with pre-assigned groups for breakout rooms

• Use pre-assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

• Use Automatically assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

• Use Manually assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

• Options Within the breakout rooms

• Seek Further Assistance

Create a meeting with pre-assigned groups for breakout rooms

Zoom breakout rooms are a great resource to keep your students connected in small groups. You can use them for small group discussions, group projects, or live oral exams.

1. On isu.zoom.us, In the Meetings tab, select Schedule a New Meeting.

2. Alternatively, edit an existing meeting by clicking on the Meetings Name/Topic.

3. Once you are in the Meeting settings, select Edit.

4. Scroll to Options, select Show, and enable Breakout Room pre-assign.

5. From here you will create the rooms either manually or you can import using a CSV file.

   1. When entering the names manually type the user's Zoom account email (generally this will be their ISU primary email).

Note: students will need to be a part of the University Zoom account to be able to put their names in the breakout room. They can get their account at isu.zoom.us/signup. Here is a comparison of a Personal account vs a University account.

2. When importing from an Excel CSV file you will use the students’ user's Zoom account email (generally this will be their ISU primary email). For more information see Pre-assigning participants to breakouts rooms using a CSV file. The Pre-assign Room Name needs to be one word. The following is a general example:

Warning - users must be logged into their ISU Zoom account within the Zoom Workplace App to be placed into the pre-assigned groups automatically. 

6. Enable the setting Only authenticated users can join.

Note: This will help prevent users from joining as guest participants and increase the likelihood of the participants being assigned to their pre-assigned breakout room.

7. Click Save Meeting.

Use pre-assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

1. Review and follow the steps in the previous section.

2. Once all meeting participants have joined the meeting, Go to breakout rooms.

3. In the breakout room settings, you will see all of the participants and which room they are assigned to. From there you can double-check who has been assigned and who has not. All participants should have been assigned to the designated rooms. You can always click the “recreate rooms” menu and select “Recover to pre-assigned rooms” in the event that the majority of participants did not get appropriately assigned. Then select “Open All Breakout Rooms.”

Warning: Participants that join with a Chromebook Zoom app, Chrome web app, or any other web-based Zoom platform will not be pre-assigned and will need to be manually allocated to a room.

The following are platforms that work with the Zoom Pre-assign Breakout Room feature:

• Zoom Desktop Client (PC, Mac, Linux)

• Zoom Cloud Meetings iOS app

• Zoom Cloud Meetings Android app

• Any remaining participants can be manually assigned. In the Breakout Rooms window, click Assign (associated with the desired room), select the desired student.

• To begin the breakout room session click Open All Rooms.

Use Automatically assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

1. Once all meeting participants have joined the meeting, Go to Breakout Rooms.

2. In the Create Breakout Rooms pop-up window, adjust the number of rooms as desired.

3. Check Automatically. 

Note: based on the number of participants and number of rooms, Zoom will provide the following statement: x participants per room.

4. Click Create Rooms.

5. The student will be automatically assigned to a random breakout room. click Open All Rooms to begin the breakout room sessions.

Use Manually assigned breakout rooms in a meeting

1. Once all meeting participants have joined the meeting, Go to Breakout Rooms.

2. In the Create Breakout Rooms pop-up window, adjust the number of rooms as desired.

3. Check Manually. 

4. Click Create Rooms.

5. In the Breakout Rooms window, click Assign (associated with the desired room), select the desired student.

6. Click Open All Rooms to begin the breakout room sessions.

Options within breakout rooms

Before opening the breakout rooms there is a list of options the Host can choose from.

1. Allow participants to choose room- The Host will sign the number of rooms but the participants choose which breakout they will join.

2. Allow Participants to return to the main session at any time- This allows the participants the control of how long they will remain in the breakout rooms.

3. Automatically move all assigned participants into breakout rooms- If this setting is not enabled when the host opens rooms a prompt will appear asking the participants to join the breakout rooms. 

4. Breakout rooms close automatically after...minutes- This gives the participants a timer in the right-hand corner of the breakout rooms.

5. Countdown after closing breakout room- This setting sends the participants an alert that the rooms are closing soon and to wrap up soon. 

   Additional Zoom resources

For more information on using breakout rooms, see Zoom Support resources:

• Managing breakout rooms
• Enabling breakout rooms
• Pre-assigning participants to breakout rooms
• Polling for meetings
• Upgrade/update to the latest version
• Participating in breakout rooms

Seek Further Assistance

For more information please visit,  Activities