In many oc­cu­pa­tion­al sectors, video con­fer­ences are part of the workday. The option to get together as a team using audio or video tech­no­logy is often not only an elemental factor when it comes to working from home, but also a fuss-free solution for catching up with col­leagues and clients that are based in different locations.

One of the most popular solutions for schedul­ing “virtual” meetings is the Cali­for­ni­an program Zoom, which is available for free with the Basic plan as well as with various Premium plans that come with ad­di­tion­al features. We’ll show you how to sign up for the service, how to set up your own Zoom meeting, and how to join a meeting that has already started.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions: How to set up a Zoom meeting

Tools for video and audio con­fer­en­cing are aimed at a wide range of users: not only in everyday office life, but also in private life, this kind of software is in­creas­ingly used as a means of com­mu­nic­a­tion. Zoom and other con­fer­en­cing tools are char­ac­ter­ised above all by their user-friend­li­ness, which enables even beginners to set up a Zoom meeting quickly and easily. For example, you can start and manage a Zoom meeting via the web browser of your choice or via native apps for Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS. The following sections will guide you through the process step by step.

Step 1: Create a Zoom account

If you want to take part in a Zoom call then all you need is a meeting ID or link that you receive from the meeting organiser. If you want to set up a Zoom meeting, however, you’ll need an active Zoom account – whether the virtual meeting takes place in the browser or app.

Note

If you don’t want to create a new Zoom account then you can also use an active Facebook or Google account to sign up to the video con­fer­en­cing service.

You can start the re­gis­tra­tion by opening up the Zoom website and clicking on the ‘Sign up, it’s free’ button. Enter your birthday and your email address before selecting ‘Sign Up’. Zoom will now send a message to your provided email address with which you can activate your account.

Image: Zoom website: ‘Confirmation email sent’ message
Zoom website: Con­firm­a­tion email sent message

As soon as you click on the ‘Activate account’ link you will be re­dir­ec­ted back to the Zoom website where you can enter your re­gis­tra­tion details like your name and a password. The options to ‘Invite Friends’ and ‘Test Meeting’ can be skipped.

Step 2: Re­gis­ter­ing with Zoom

After re­gis­ter­ing, you’re auto­mat­ic­ally signed in to your Zoom account, where you can plan or launch meetings as well as join ongoing meetings. For later use, navigate to the ‘Sign In’ button and log in with your email address and password. If you download one of the many available Zoom apps for your device, then sign in in the same way using your in­form­a­tion – at least for the first sign in attempt.

Step 3: Set up a Zoom meeting

If you’re signed in to your account then the fastest way to set up a meeting is via the ‘Instant Meetings’ function.

In the browser

In the browser, you can create an ‘Instant Meeting’ in Zoom via the ‘Host a Meeting’ button. In the drop-down menu, select whether your camera should be activated or switched off, or al­tern­at­ively whether you only want to share your screen.

Image: Zoom account in the browser: User interface to ‘Host a Meeting’
If you want to use your personal meeting ID for instant meetings on Zoom, you can activate this option in your account in the “Personal Meeting ID” section – otherwise the video con­fer­en­cing tool will generate a random meeting ID.

Once you’ve made your selection, a new window will open. Here, click on the ‘Launch Meeting’ button and then ‘Join from Your Browser’ to start the Zoom meeting.

Image: Zoom in the browser: “Launch Meeting” dialog box
Zoom in the browser: “Launch Meeting” dialog box.

Use the ‘Par­ti­cipants’ button to invite ad­di­tion­al users to the Zoom video con­fer­ence you’ve created.

Image: A Zoom meeting that has been set up in the browser
A Zoom meeting that has been set up in the browser.

In the app

A quick meeting can just as easily be started by using the down­load­able apps:

  1. Press on the button ‘New Meeting’ and choose whether your camera will be turned on or off – the option to share your screen is only available in iOS and Android for Zoom on mobile.
  2. If you want to use your personal meeting ID you can activate this option now.
  3. Launch the Zoom meeting by selecting ‘Start a Meeting’.
  4. Invite ad­di­tion­al users via ‘Par­ti­cipants’ > ‘Invite’.
Image: Starting a meeting in the Zoom app for Android
Starting a meeting in the Zoom app for Android

Step 4: Schedul­ing a Zoom meeting

While video and audio con­fer­ences can sometimes occur spon­tan­eously, they are often scheduled ahead of time. Thanks to the ‘Schedule a Meeting’ option, you don’t have to wait until the desired meeting time to plan your virtual get-together, but can pencil it in ahead of time. In addition, you have the option to pre-send an invite to all par­ti­cipants that you’d like to invite to your Zoom meeting.

A series of settings are available for your scheduled online meeting:

  • Topic: The name of your Zoom meeting
  • De­scrip­tion: Optional de­scrip­tion of your meeting
  • When: Date and start time of your video con­fer­ence
  • Duration: Duration of your video con­fer­ence
  • Time zone: Time zone of your selected meeting time
  • Recurring meeting: Optional and can be activated for regular meetings (daily, weekly, or monthly)
  • Meeting ID: ID of your planned Zoom meeting; usually randomly generated or using a personal ID
  • Security: Passcode to enter the meeting with an optional waiting room function where par­ti­cipants need to be let in by the host
  • Video: Camera for mod­er­at­ors and par­ti­cipants turned on or off as standard
  • Meeting options: Extended setting to, for example, auto­mat­ic­ally mute par­ti­cipants when they join the meeting or to auto­mat­ic­ally record the meeting

Once you’ve cus­tom­ised your settings, click on “Save” to create the planned Zoom meeting.

Image: Zoom web application: Scheduling a meeting
Zoom web ap­plic­a­tion: Schedul­ing a meeting

All planned meeting can be viewed in the “Meetings” menu point within the “Personal” section.

Image: Zoom web application: Joining a meeting
Zoom web ap­plic­a­tion: Joining a meeting
Tip

Video con­fer­ences sig­ni­fic­antly fa­cil­it­ate the modern workday. But regular virtual meetings can also lead to a certain degree of ex­haus­tion for all par­ti­cipants. Zoom fatigue, as the phe­nomen­on has been called, also occurs with Zoom al­tern­at­ives, and poses a challenge when it comes to mastering our everyday, digital working lives.

Step 5: Joining a Zoom meeting

Using your re­gistered Zoom account, you can of course also join Zoom meetings that have been created by other users. To do this, press the button ‘Join a Meeting’ or ‘Par­ti­cip­ate’ in the app, enter the meeting ID or the in­vit­a­tion link that you pre­vi­ously received from the organiser, and press ‘Join’ or ‘Par­ti­cip­ate’ (in the app) in the last step.

Image: Zoom web application: Joining a meeting
Zoom web ap­plic­a­tion: Joining a meeting

As pre­vi­ously mentioned, you can also join a meeting without your own Zoom account. The process for this isn’t different to the one described here – in the mobile app, the button simply uses slightly different wording.

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