A Teams Live Event is a virtual broadcast. In contrast to a Teams Meeting, which is designed for interactive and collaborative participation of up to 1000 attendees, Live Event is best for scenarios where a few designated people are presenting and all others are attending as viewers (attendees) with access to just a text based Q&A. Attendees cannot share their screen, camera feed or use microphone while attending the Teams Live Event. A Teams Live Event can accommodate up to 10,000 attendees making it the best option for webinars, town halls, conferences, community events such as convocations, or lectures for large classes. Presenters use Microsoft Teams to create the broadcast, and one (or more) presenters need to be invited with the producer role. The producer switches the active video feed.
If you are using external presenters, please read the related KB article Having External Presenters in a Live Event.
A Private Teams Meeting
The organizer creates a Live Stream event and invites users who will be the producer(s) and/or presenter(s). Attendees are not invited to the meeting.
The producer(s) and presenter(s) create the live stream broadcast using Microsoft Teams. Attendees are not in the Teams meeting, and they should not be invited to the Live Event via the calendar entry. Instead, the attendees can be sent the link to the meeting.
Above is an example of a Live Event entry. There is one producer (Stephen) and two presenters (Bodek and Lorie). The Join button will connect to the private Teams meeting. Do not forward this meeting invitation to attendees.
Attendees will join using the link that can be obtained from the Get Attendee Link button.
This “private” meeting has all the regular features of a Teams meeting (screen and application sharing, Web cams, multiple people talking at the same time, and a chat window) but with a couple of differences:
- In a regular Teams meeting, the video camera is turned on automatically when a presenter speaks. In a Live Event, the producer controls which presenter is live.
- In a regular Teams meeting, any presenter can share their screen or app. When the app is shared, participants see it immediately. In a regular Teams meeting, participants see up to nine camera sources (participants). In a Live Event, the presenter chooses which participant is shown and only one participant’s camera and/or screen is shown, chosen by the producer.
- In a Live Event, there is an extra button in the toolbar to open the Q&A window (just to the left of the hang-up red button)
Options when Scheduling the Live Event
When creating the Live Event, the organizer can specify the audience of the event. Creating public events is restricted to an access group, since the number of concurrent live events is limited. If you need to create a public event, and this option is not available, contact IT Services to request access.
The organizer can also set additional options:
- Select if a recording is to be available to attendees
- Turn on live captions (this requires selecting a language)
- Select up to six languages for near instant translation
- Choose to create an attendee engagement report
- Choose to turn on the Q&A chat – where attendees can post questions, or presenters can make announcements. This chat is separate from the meeting chat – which is only visible to the presenters and producers.
- Select an external app (like OBS) or a device (like a video switcher) to feed in the audio and video. If you select this, then you won’t be able to use any of the options described in this document.
- Specify a URL that the attendees can follow to get support information
Sharing Content (Camera or Window/Screen)
It is up to the presenters to share content which is their video camera, or a window or screen. Each presenter chooses what to send to the Teams meeting. The Live Event producer selects the participant that is to be broadcast by adding that presenter to the queue and then making it live.
If the presenter wants to include audio as part of their shared window or screen, make sure that “Share System Audio” is checked. On the Mac, the system audio is automatically shared. It is up to the presenter to adjust the volume, so it should be set to a level that matches the level of the meeting conversation.
Presenters can turn their camera or microphone on and off. The producer cannot turn a participant camera or microphone on. If a presenter stops sharing while they are live, or if they turn off their camera while they are live, the audience will see a blank screen with the message “the live event will continue in a moment”. If microphones are on, and presenters are speaking, that audio will be sent to the audience.
Handing the Q&A Chat
If possible, the Q&A chat should be handled by a dedicated meeting presenter or another producer. There may be many messages coming in and it is distracting for the presenters to have to focus on their presentation and the Q&A chat.
All presenters and producers can control (moderate) the Q&A chat. Messages from the audience can be published, answered privately, or discarded. The moderator should communicate to the presenter(s) any questions from the chat, if you want to have near-live audience interaction. Presenters should pause if they want to take questions from the audience.
Due to the nature of the content delivery network, it may take about 20-30 seconds for the audience to experience what is happening in the Teams meeting. Presenters should plan for this delay and prompt people to ask questions and wait 30 or more seconds before expecting questions from the audience.
If an attendee pauses the live event, when they resume, the meeting will continue from where it was paused. This will create a further delay to the “live” presentation. The attendee can move forward to catch up, but the organizer and presenters need to be aware that the audience could be in different times.
If an attendee is using a mobile phone, and they press the Q&A chat button, the presentation is automatically paused while they enter their question on their mobile device. On a PC or tablet, users can see the Q&A chat and the video window at the same time.
Post-Event Resources
If a presenter, producer, or organizer opens the calendar entry for the Teams event, they can access the recording, reports and transcript if they were enabled by the organizer.
Tips for Success
- Presenters and the producer should have reliable high speed (3+ MB/s) connection to the Internet.
- A wired connection to a router is preferred. If using WiFi, choose a 5 GHz channel where possible.
- Wearing headsets will reduce audio feedback. If this is not possible, then presenters should mute their microphones when they are not speaking.
Additional Resources