Virtual breakout rooms for Microsoft Teams – everything you need to know

It’s been teased for months but virtual breakout rooms for Microsoft Teams is almost here.

To celebrate, I thought I’d gather together everything we know about how breakout rooms will work so you can get ready to start using the new feature as soon as it’s available, Virtual breakout rooms is expected available to everyone by the end of November 2020.

To get started, there are a few things you’ll want to know about how to get the most out of breakout rooms and make sure your first lesson goes without a hitch.

To Teams breakout rooms all meeting participants need to be running the latest version of Microsoft Teams. Users on an older version of Teams will not be able to use the feature.

When students join a breakout room will automatically be set as a presenter. This means that they can freely present, share their screen, and use Whiteboard, but it also means they may have more control over the meeting than they would otherwise. This is something you will want to be aware of.

You can only create and manage breakout rooms using the Windows or Mac desktop app. Breakout rooms cannot be created or managed on the web or using the mobile app. Students can join breakout rooms from iPad, iPhone, and Android devices using the mobile app.

Breakout rooms cannot be used if the student joins using the same meeting and same account from multiple devices

What are virtual breakout rooms?

Breakout rooms allow meeting organisers (usually teachers) to split online lessons into smaller sessions for focused discussions. This new feature gives teachers much greater control during online lessons, particularly when teaching large groups of students.

How to turn on virtual breakout rooms

Microsoft 365 Administrators

To use breakout rooms, your school’s Microsoft 365 administrator needs to make sure the following settings are turned on in the Teams Admin Center. These settings are all found in the Meetings > Meeting policies section:

1. Allow scheduling private meeting = on
2. Allow Meet now in private meeting = on
3. Allow channel meeting scheduling = on
4. Allow meet now in channels = on

Meeting Organisers (Teachers) and Participants (Students)

To see the breakout rooms option within your meetings, you must turn on the new Teams meeting experience by:

1. Clicking on your profile image within Teams
2. Selecting Settings
3. Checking the “Turn on new meeting experience” option within General settings.
4. Restarting your Teams app.

You can double check that the setting is setup correctly by starting a meeting and verifying that the meeting opens in its own window. You can find out more information about the new meeting experience here.

How to use virtual breakout rooms

Once turned on you should see the new breakout room icon at the top-right when you start a new video meeting:

Why I can’t see the breakout rooms option?

There are several reasons that you may not see the new breakout room feature:

• The update is not scheduled to be available to everyone until the end of November 2020.
• You must be a meeting organizer to see the option. Meeting attendees and presenters will not see the breakout rooms option.
• Make sure all meeting participants, including the meeting organiser, are using the latest version of Teams. If joining on Android or iOS mobile or tablet, make sure participants go to their App Store and download the latest update.
• You must be using the desktop app to create and manage breakout rooms.

Moving between breakout rooms

When using breakout rooms, there are a few rules that students and teachers will want to know:

• Teachers can assign students to breakout rooms.
• Students cannot return to the main meeting room on their own.
• Students must wait for the teacher to pull them back to the main meeting.
• Teachers can manage rooms and move between rooms freely

How many breakout rooms can I create?

You can create up to 50 breakout rooms per meeting and have a total of 25,000 team members. Class sizes are always a concern, but if your school has reached that number you may have bigger problems. 😉

Can I setup breakout rooms during an active meeting or do I need to prepare them first?

Currently you can only setup breakout rooms during a meeting. Microsoft is working on a feature to allow the creation of breakout rooms before a meeting.

Can I send an announcement to all breakout rooms at once?

You will be able to send a message or announcement to all breakout rooms at once which will show up as a chat message. You can use this to ask students to return to the main meeting or send updated instructions.

Where and when can I set up breakout rooms?

• You can set up breakout rooms after you join the meeting as the organizer. You can bulk create rooms at the start, or manually add or remove rooms.
• You can set up breakout rooms from desktop app, but not in mobile and web.

When can I assign participants to breakout room?

• You can assign participants when setting up rooms. You can do so manually before the rooms open or reassign participants to a different room while the room is open.
• You can also auto-assign the participants to rooms when you first set up the rooms in the meeting.

Additional breakout room features

Microsoft has put a lot of consideration into how virtual breakout rooms work. On top of everything above the teacher or meeting organise can also:

• Create breakout rooms in scheduled private meetings (including recurring) and private meet now meetings
• Add, remove, delete breakout rooms
• Rename rooms to the title of your choice
• Reassign room participants from one room to another before as well as while the rooms are open
• Room transition: as an organizer, you can decide if participants get moved to the room automatically when you open the room, or, if they need to click to confirm the move. The “auto-accept” setting is available per meeting.
• Chats, files, and recordings: only the organizer will always have access to all rooms meeting artifacts

Features available for students::

• Join breakout rooms from web, desktop, iOS, iPads, Android mobiles and tablets. Note that organizers cannot move participants who joined via Desk phones or Teams devices join to a breakout room, they can stay in main meeting as their breakout room.
• Participants join the room as presenters, so they can present, share Whiteboard, etc. freely.
• Participants cannot add others to meeting chat, copy meeting details, nudge others to the meeting, or use “call me back”
• Hoping between rooms: Meeting participants cannot hop back to main meeting or between rooms on their own. They must wait for the meeting organizer to pull them back to the main meeting.
• Chat during the breakout session. Chat and artifacts shared during meeting are viewable for room participants.
• Chats, files, and recordings: Participants have access to artifacts, but only organizer has access to the links – if link is shared by meeting organizer, then participants will have access
• Breakout rooms is not supported when the participant joins the same meeting and same account from multiple devices