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Immersive View

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Recreate the feel of your class or conference room by placing up to 25 video participants onto a single virtual background. Participants are automatically placed onto provided scenes and the host can adjust the arrangements as needed. The host can also use their own custom background for a unique scene. While this does not require use of the Virtual Background feature, it does work best when everyone has this functionality. 

When used in a webinar, the host and panelists will be placed together onto the virtual background, while attendees view the scene.

Participants using versions of the Zoom desktop client, mobile app, and Zoom Rooms that do not support Immersive View view other participants in either Gallery View or Speaker View (whichever was used before Immersive View started), and participants are displayed with a black background. Those who are able to view the Immersive View see these attendees in the scene with their original background, virtual or not. Participants placed onto the scene without meeting Virtual Background system requirements are displayed with a circular frame around them, while video off participants appear as their profile picture. 

When screen sharing, the Immersive View ends and is replaced by the shared screen. When sharing stops, the Immersive View begins again with the same positions as before.

Currently, only local recording of Immersive Views is supported. When in Immersive View, only the immersive scene will be captured, while other video thumbnails will not be recorded. Cloud Recordings just appear as Gallery or Speaker layout, depending on cloud recording settings.

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Prerequisites for using immersive view

Note: The mobile apps can also participate in Immersive View, but it must be started by a user on the desktop client. 

Starting Immersive View

  1. Start a meeting or webinar as the host.
  2. In the top-right corner, click View .
  3. Click Immersive .
  4. Select one of the following options for placing participants into the scene:
    • Automatically: This will include as many participants as possible in the scene you select. Participants can be swapped out and arranged during the immersive scene.
    • Manually: You will add or remove participants as you wish. If more than are allowed for a particular scene are selected, extras will be removed.
  5. Select the scene you would like to use. Each scene designates the max number of predefined places for attendees.
  6. Click Start to begin the Immersive View.

Changing Immersive View

  1. In the top-right corner, click View .
  2. Click Change Immersive View .
  3. Select the new scene and check participant assignments.
  4. Click Start to launch the new scene.

Using a custom Immersive View

If the standard set of scenes doesn’t suit your needs, you can also upload a custom scene. There are no predefined spaces when using a custom scene, so participants must be placed manually by the host. Custom backgrounds should match the resolution and file types required for virtual backgrounds images for best results.

  1. In the top-right corner, click View .
  2. Click Change Immersive View .
  3. Click  to add a custom background.
  4. In the file selection dialog, find and select the image you want to use.
  5. Click Open.
  6. Click Start to launch the new scene.
  7. Click and drag participant videos down onto the scene, adjusting their size as needed.

Moving and adjusting participants

When the immersive view begins, as many participants’/panelists’ videos as that scene allows by default (or fewer) will be placed in the predefined locations.

When predefined locations are filled, not every participant is selected for the scene, or attendees arrive late, extra participants are placed above the immersive scene. The host can leave these videos above the scene, can click and drag the video down to an empty location, or click and drag the video to replace someone else. Videos dropped near a predefined location will snap to that location and that scene’s size for each video.

To resize a video:

  1. Click on the video participant to see a thin, blue box outlining their video panel.
  2. Click and drag the participant to a location in the scene.
  3. Click and drag one of the corners of the box to resize their video.

Ending Immersive View

  1. In the top-right corner, click View .
  2. Click another available video layout, such as Speaker or  Gallery .
  3. Click Stop to confirm ending Immersive View.
  4. (Optional) Select Don’t ask me again to prevent the confirmation window in the future.

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