How to customize your video layout during a Zoom virtual meeting

During your Zoom meetings and presentations, you can adjust your video layout settings to suit your needs – see all, hide participants, and more. When no one is sharing the screen, meeting participants have the option to choose from 4 different video layouts: speaker view, gallery view, immersive view, and floating thumbnail view. You can choose to show screen sharing in speaker view when someone is using side-by-side mode, or use side-by-side mode when someone is sharing with you. You can use any of these layouts in full-screen mode, except for the floating thumbnail, which cannot be used in full-screen mode.

Additionally, video layout controls allow you to rearrange the gallery view order, pin or highlight the videos of up to nine participants, hide participants who are not showing video, or stop all incoming video.

Requirements for changing meeting view settings

The mobile app (gallery view):

There must be three or more participants in a meeting (only two participants are required on iPads)

When viewing thumbnails in gallery view, a maximum of 49 thumbnails are displayed per page:

Install the Zoom desktop client on your computer if you are using Windows or macOS version 5.2.0 or later
There is a setting in the desktop client’s video settings that allows 49 participants per screen to be displayed in the gallery view
Note: This option cannot be used if your computer does not meet the requirements.
Here are the processors that can be used with just one display.
- Intel i5
  - 4 cores or higher
  - 4th generation or higher
- Intel i7, i9, Xeon
- Intel Atom
- Other Intel processors
  - 6 cores or higher
  - 3.0GHz or higher
- AMD Ryzen 5 series
Processors are supported for dual monitor configurations
- Intel i5
  - 4 cores or higher
  - 6th generation or higher
  - 2.0GHz or higher
- Intel i7, i9, Xeon
- Intel Atom
  - 6 cores or higher
  - 1.6GHz frequency higher; OR
  - 8 cores or higher
- Other Intel processors
  - 8 cores or higher
  - 3.0GHz or higher; OR
  - 12 cores or higher
- AMD Ryzen 7/9 series
  Note: Even if you have dual monitors, the desktop client only displays the gallery view on one and only one computer monitor.
ZVersion 5.6.6 (423) or higher of the Zoom mobile app for iOS (iPad only)
The Zoom app for iOS was originally launched for the iPad in April 2012.

speaker view

The speaker view feature toggles the large video window between the speaker and three or more other meeting participants while the speaker is speaking. In the event that there are only two participants, your video will shrink at the top while the other participant’s video will appear below yours.

Pinning an attendee will keep that attendee the largest video for the entire meeting, while highlighting the same attendee will do so for all attendees in the meeting.

gallery view

You can view gallery thumbnails of meeting participants in a grid pattern that expands and contracts as participants join and leave the meeting. With this desktop client, the gallery view can display up to 25 or 49 participants on a single screen, depending on your computer’s speed. As long as there are more participants in the meeting than can be displayed, additional pages will be created with the maximum number of thumbnails per page. To view the next page of participants, in gallery view, click the right or left arrow to scroll through the previous page and view up to 1,000 thumbnails at a time.

There is also an option to change the order of the videos in the gallery view to suit your needs and save them for use in future sessions. For more information, see the article on setting a custom gallery view order.

Once a participant starts speaking in the gallery view, the speaker is automatically repositioned and highlighted on the displayed page, making it easier for you to see who is speaking. When using a custom gallery order, this functionality is not possible as the order will persist even after the order is deleted.

Meeting window in full screen mode

By double-clicking on your zoom window, you can toggle any of the layouts to full screen (except for the floating thumbnail window).

If you’ve decided to exit full-screen mode, you can double-click again or use the Esc key on your keyboard to do so.

Note: In older versions of macOS, click Meeting in the top menu bar, then click Full Screen.

Floating thumbnail window

When you minimize the main zoom window, this floating thumbnail window allows you to keep the video close to the top of other applications while keeping the main zoom window minimized. The video window can be moved anywhere on your screen or hidden entirely.

If you want to show floating thumbnails, follow these instructions:

If you’re using Windows, click the minimize icon in the top-right corner, and for macOS, click the minimize icon in the top-left corner.
By clicking the arrow to the left of the video, you can collapse the video once in the mini-window view. You can expand the thumbnail by clicking the arrow again.
As well as turning your video on and off, you can easily mute or unmute yourself in this mode by clicking the or and buttons respectively.
The floating thumbnail panel can be closed by clicking the arrow on the right side of the window and you can then access the full zoom panel.

Screen sharing layout

When viewing shared content, you have the following 3 viewing options:

Default: The shared content is below this section, and a series of video tiles are on top, similar to how it appears in Speaker view. Content fills the entire screen in full-screen mode, while video tiles become smaller, moving thumbnails in full-screen mode.
Side-by-Side: Speakers: When using Side-by-Side mode, the meeting window is split between the video thumbnails and the shared content, and you can adjust the proportions of the split between the two to suit your needs. ‘Side by Side’: The speaker only displays the active speaker in the part that contains video thumbnails.
Side by Side: Gallery: The meeting window is divided into two sections: the shared content and video thumbnails, the proportion of split between the two can be adjusted in real time while the mode is side by side. Side by side: When the shared content takes up the most space, the gallery will display a maximum of 6 such thumbnails (when the shared content gets the least space) or 49 such thumbnails (when the shared content gets the most space) in the gallery part that the Contains thumbnails for the shared content.

Regardless of the view setting selected, the meeting window can be maximized to show any of these options.

Hide participants whose video is disabled

Any layout that has a video turned off or joined by phone will have 3 dots in the top right corner of each video thumbnail. To access the 3 dots, click on the 3 dots in the top right corner of any video thumbnail.
If you want to hide all participants who are not participating in the video, click Hide non-video participants at the bottom of the page.
You can change the display settings by clicking the Show button in the upper-right corner of the screen and selecting the Show non-video participants option to show the non-video participants again.

If you want to conserve your bandwidth or avoid mental exhaustion, you can also stop all incoming videos.

Switch between gallery view and speaker view during a meeting

window | macOS | Linux

Join or start a meeting.
Then you can select either Speakers or Gallery in the top right corner of the screen.

Note: Depending on the number of participants you have selected on your screen, you may need to resize the window or switch to full screen mode to include all 49 thumbnails.

android | iOS

Join or start a meeting.
The active speaker view is displayed by default in the Zoom mobile app. You can see a video thumbnail in the lower-right corner when one or more participants join the meeting.
To switch from active speaker view to gallery view, swipe left from active speaker view.
Note: The option to change the view to gallery view is only available when there are at least three participants in the meeting.
During a meeting, the video can be viewed by up to four participants at the same time. If you keep swiping left, you can view other participants’ videos.
To switch back to the active speaker view, swipe right to the first screen.

iPad

Note: When viewing on an 11″ or 12.9″ iPad Pro (2nd, 3rd and 4th generation), you can view up to 16 participants at once in Gallery view and up to 30 participants on a 12.9″ iPad Pro (5th generation) see. , and up to 49 participants when viewed on a 12.9″ iPad Pro (5th Gen).

Tap Switch to gallery view in the upper-left corner of the Zoom window to switch from Active Speaker view. If you don’t see the controls, tap your screen to make them appear.
Note: If there are 2 or more participants in the meeting, you can only switch to gallery view.When you click the button, the gallery will appear. A maximum of 16 (4 x 4) or 25 (5 x 5) people can be viewed at the same time.
It is possible to switch back to the active speaker view by tapping the screen to reveal the controls in the upper left corner of the zoom window and then tapping Switch to active speaker in the upper right corner.

web client

With the web client you can start a meeting or join an existing one.
If you click View in the top right, you can select either Speaker or Gallery to see who is speaking.

Note: There is a limit of 9 videos per page in the web client gallery view. As a result, the web client is currently not compatible with all major web browsers due to technical limitations and to maintain compatibility.

frequently asked Questions

You can choose the video layout on Zoom Rooms screens using the Zoom Rooms controller. Choose the layout by tapping Change View in Zoom Rooms with a screen on the controller. Active Speaker and Gallery views can be toggled in multi-screen Zoom Rooms.