Depending on the size of your webinar license, Zoom Webinar can broadcast Zoom meetings to up to 50,000 view-only participants. Starting at 500 participants, webinar licenses scale up to 50,000. In a webinar, you can share your screen, video, and audio, and attendees can interact with the host and panelists via chat and question-answer options.

During webinars, attendees can either register in advance with the option for the host to add custom registration questions, or they can simply click a link during the webinar to join. Webinars can be held one time, reoccur in a series, or the same session can be repeated more than once.

Discover the differences between a webinar and a meeting.

The article discusses:

• Purchasing a webinar license
• Registration for webinars
  • Registration approval
• Scheduling a webinar
• Inviting attendees and panelists
• Starting a webinar

Prerequisites

• A Licensed user with the Webinar Add-on (500, 1000, 3000, 5000, 10000, or 50000)
• Zoom desktop client
  • Windows: version 3.0 or higher
  • macOS: version 3.0 or higher
  • Linux: version 3.0 or higher
• Zoom mobile app
  • Android: version 3.0 or higher
  • iOS: version 3.0 or higher

Note:

The Zoom Rooms and CRC (H.323 and SIP) devices can participate in webinars and be panelists, but they cannot be the webinar host.

Zoom Support must enable 720p or 1080p quality feeds for attendees. Please allow three business days after contacting support for the feature to be enabled. For 720p or 1080p Group HD, all other requirements must also be met.

Purchasing a webinar license

Visit the Billing page in your account or contact sales to purchase a webinar license. Once the license is purchased, you can assign it.

Webinar registration

There may be a pre-registration requirement for webinars. Registrations can be approved automatically or manually by the host. Questions can be added to the registration and reports can be generated.

On the other hand, the host can turn off registration for the webinar, although attendees will be asked to enter their name and email address when joining and the reports will only include the information they provide.

Registration approval

For webinars that require registration, there are two approval methods

1. Approve automatically –
2. A confirmation email containing details on how to participate in the webinar will automatically be sent to every registrant.
3. Approve manually –
4.  Registrants must be manually approved or declined by the webinar host. The registrant will receive an email containing information about joining the webinar if they have been approved.

With Webinar Reports, custom fields can be added to registration for webinars that require registration.

Scheduling a webinar

• Learn how to schedule a Webinar that requires registration
• Learn how to schedule a Webinar without registration

Notes:

• It should be noted that a non-recurring webinar ID will expire 30 days after the meeting is scheduled. However, the webinar cannot be started after the scheduled date/time has passed. If you edit the webinar in the Previous Webinars tab and reschedule for a later date, you can start the webinar again and it will remain on the list of previous webinars for another 30 days after its new scheduled date. Before the scheduled webinar date, you are able to restart the same webinar ID as many times as you wish.
• There is a 365-day expiration period after the webinar is started on the last occasion of a recurring webinar ID. The webinar ID can be re-used for subsequent webinars in the future.
• It is possible to start scheduled webinars prior to their scheduled start time. There is no expiration or inactivation of the links unless it has been more than 365 days since the last use for a recurring webinar or past the scheduled date for a non-recurring webinar.

Inviting attendees and panelists

The panelists participate fully in the meeting. Video can be viewed and sent, screen sharing can be carried out, and annotations can be added.

A webinar’s maximum number of participants is not affected by the number of panelists, but rather by the number of seats available for the meeting. We would like to remind you that panelists will receive separate invitations from the attendees of the webinar, which contain their unique URLs and other details about joining.

Find out more about the panelists.

Hosts have the option of unmuting attendees, who can view but not participate. Hosts control what attendees see during the webinar. Your webinar license determines how many attendees can attend (500, 1000, 3000, etc.). Your webinar attendees are able to ask questions and interact with the panelists during the webinar.

You can copy the join link and send it to attendees if the webinar does not require registration.

Registration for the webinar will be required, and the host will need to share the registration link and have attendees complete the registration form. As soon as they register, they will receive a registration link by email. The attendee will be directed to the registration page if they use a generic join link or the Webinar ID to join.

You can invite attendees to register in three different ways:

• Use email, your website, or other means to share the registration URL.
• Zoom will create an invitation which you can view and copy, then send to your attendees.
• To receive a copy of the Zoom invitation that you can then forward to potential attendees, select Email me the invitation.

Starting a webinar

You can start your webinar in a few different ways.

• Log in to the Zoom web portal and click Webinars. Select the webinar you wish to attend, and click Begin.

• Open Zoom on your desktop and click Meetings. Click Start when you find the webinar.

• Click on the link displayed on your calendar reminder if you added this to your calendar. Ensure that you are logged into your Zoom account before clicking the link.