Differences Zoom Meeting vs. Webinar
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Hello community,
does anyone know if there is a teechnical difference between Zoom Meeting and Zoom Webinar regarding the technical inclusion. Eg. if I want to stream a stage to it? Is it a separate Software or is it just the same client with different features?
I tried to find some infos, but it is always only about the feature differences. I opted for a demo, but it is probably an selling call what's coming.
Any hint is appreciated.Thank you,
Dill -
@dillthekraut I am more than happy to advise you on the differences. The normal Zoom client supports Meetings and Webinars, and each platform has unique features. What in particular are you interested in discovering about each service? Izzy stages can be streamed to both, but there are some precautions to be made aware of when using a webinar (such as the practical impossibility of streaming 30FPS 1080p to Webinar attendees unless you pay tens of thousands of dollars a year to Zoom).
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Hello Andy, sorry for the delayed reply and thank you for answering my questions! Which answered the use of the Zoom software.
I do have a client which would like to do an hybrid show via the webinar license, which they claim to have. I probably need to aks which specific license this is.
Your Info about the stream quality, was another question which I had and answered myself after digging deep in the Zoom subscription plan discriptions, putting together the scattered puzzle parts. I found this all a bit confusing at first, but maybe it was just for me.
After clicking through the subscription plan pages I found this page. Until then I did not understand the combination of Zoom Meeting and Webinar as kind of an upgrade or "add on". But still you have to dig deep to find the information about the "Group HD" 'option':
"For attendees to have feeds in 720p or 1080p quality, the respective quality needs to be enabled by Zoom Support. After contacting support, please allow up to 3 business days for the feature to be enabled. All other prerequisites for 720p or 1080p Group HD must be met as well.".
This all actualy means, you have to have a Meeting license of any level and add a Webinar license to it. But in the end even if you have the apropriate licenses (Pro (720p), Business, Enterprise, Education (1080p)), you have to ask the support to activate the "Group HD" option to work, anyway. Is this needed for every single meeting/webinar, or just once?
I know, I could just ask the support, but as we allready talking about it, maybe this is helpfull for other forum members as well.
By the way, is ZoomOSC working for all these Webinar options the same way as it does for the Meeting? Especialy regarding the panellist?
greets,
Dill -
Let's spend a moment on meeting resolutions. The following policies apply to the quality and frame rate of Zoom in meetings and webinars:
- Zoom Pro ($15 US/month/seat I believe) can do 720p meeting contributions for meetings of less than 4 people in most cases. This means that a video feed at full screen will be able to bump to 720p if the webcam creating the feed supports it.
- Zoom Business and Enterprise accounts can submit support tickets to justify a need to increase to 1080p (this is what my company did, and it cost quite a bit of money but was a necessity for our productions). This increase also removes the four person resolution cap.
The above applies to the camera input into Zoom, which can of course be a virtual input as well, allowing simultaneous HD and 30 fps support. There are other methods of increasing resolution as well, such as screen sharing:
- Normal screen sharing will prioritize resolution over frame rate. This is good for slides, but can be rough for video playback.
- Enabling "Optimize for Video" in the screen sharing option will allow you to go up to 30 fps, but resolution will drop.
In general, the advice is to find some method of getting HD for your video contribution versus using screen sharing.
There is a great workaround to the above system though, and it involves a Facebook Portal or Amazon Echo device. If one of these devices joins a meeting (or even just a meeting's waiting room) for roughly 30 seconds, the resolution of the meeting (regardless of the creating account) will bump to Group HD 720p for the duration of the call, even if the device leaves the call! This is a very affordable way of bumping your events and performances to HD.
Now, regarding Webinars, the panel follows the above system, but sending FHD to the attendees of the webinar requires an additional bag of money and an intervention from Zoom support. Most Zoom production companies I know, including my own, cannot get this, but the largest ones have managed it (some pay six figures to Zoom annually, and thus get a special treatment).
I'm going to make a post about Zoom Test Kitchen, which is a great place to go twice per week to learn all of these rules, settings, and conditions.
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@dillthekraut and ZoomOSC is compatible with Meetings and Webinars
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@liminal_andy said:
will bump to Group HD 720p for the duration of the call, even if the device leaves the call!
That's a fun hack, thank you for sharing your knowledge here again!
