Breakout Rooms in Teams Tutorial

This Breakout Rooms in Teams tutorial is suitable for users of any version of Microsoft Teams.  

OBJECTIVE

Use Breakout Rooms in Teams to divide meeting participants into sub-groups or rooms to facilitate brainstorming sessions, group exercises, and discussion.

VIDEO TUTORIAL – BREAKOUT ROOMS IN TEAMS

BREAKOUT ROOMS EXPLAINED

In large meetings or training sessions, it can be difficult to create meaningful connections or facilitate group discussions, activities, and exercises. However, a recent update has seen breakout room functionality added to Teams.

Breakout rooms allow meeting organizers to divide meeting participants into sub-groups or rooms.

The meeting organizer can create up to 50 breakout rooms and automatically or manually assign participants into rooms. Breakout rooms can be started in a Teams meeting or in a channel.

The meeting organizer has control over the breakout room settings. They can choose to allow participants to come back to the main meeting and then return to the assigned breakout room. This is helpful if a participant has a question or needs to clarify something as it doesn’t disturb the discussion in the breakout room.

The meeting organizer can create, rename, and delete rooms as needed. Once the breakout rooms are open, the meeting organizer can move participants around and join any of the breakout sessions.

Organizers can recall participants back to the main meeting at any time and can post broadcast announcements to all rooms.

Any files or whiteboards shared in the breakout rooms will be available in the main meeting chat once all participants are back together.

Important notes about breakrooms in Teams

1. Only the meeting organizer can start breakout rooms.
2. You can only start breakout rooms on the Teams desktop client.
3. Ensure you enable breakout room functionality in the Teams settings (Teams > Settings > General > Check ‘Turn on new meeting experience’).
4. Participants can join a breakout room from the desktop, web, or mobile client.

CREATE BREAKOUT ROOMS

Breakout rooms can only be created once the organizer has started a meeting.

1. Start a meeting.
2. From the menu, click the Breakout rooms icon.

• Select the number of breakout rooms you want to create.
• Choose how you want to assign participants to rooms: Automatically or Manually.

If you choose to assign participants automatically, Teams will randomly assign participants to each room for you. If you want to be particular about which participant is assigned to each room, assign them manually.

• Select Manually.

The breakout rooms are created with the generic names of ‘Room 1’, ‘Room 2’, ‘Room 3’ etc.

Meeting participants are listed above ready to be assigned to the rooms.

RENAME THE BREAKOUT ROOMS

By default, Teams will give the breakout rooms generic names. It’s recommended that you rename each room, so there’s no confusion.

1. Hover your mouse over Room 1.
2. Click the ellipses.
3. Select Rename room from the menu.

1. Type a name for the breakout room.
2. Click Rename room.
3. Repeat these steps to rename the remaining breakout rooms.

ASSIGNING PARTICIPANTS TO BREAKOUT ROOMS

Notice that all breakout rooms are closed. Breakout rooms cannot be opened until participants have been assigned.

1. Select a participant from the list.
2. Click Assign.
3. Choose a breakout room.

• Repeat this process to assign the remaining participants to breakout rooms.

MOVING PARTICIPANTS TO ANOTHER BREAKOUT ROOM

Once you have assigned participants to a room, you can switch them around between breakout rooms.

1. Click the arrow to expand the breakout room.
2. Select the participant that you want to move to a different room.
3. Click Assign.
4. Choose a breakout room.

ADD AND DELETE BREAKOUT ROOMS

Create additional breakout rooms on the fly and delete breakout rooms that are no longer required.

Add a breakout room

1. Click Add room.
2. Rename the breakout room if required.
3. Assign participants to the room.

Delete a breakout room

1. Hover your mouse over the breakout room to be deleted.
2. Click the ellipses.
3. Select Delete room from the menu.

BREAKOUT ROOM SETTINGS

It’s a good idea to check your room settings prior to opening the breakout rooms.

1. At the top of the Breakout rooms pane, click the ellipses.
2. Click Room settings.

Use the toggle to turn either setting off or on. We recommend that you toggle both on so that participants can be moved easily between rooms and participants can leave the breakout room return to the main meeting at any time.

OPEN THE BREAKOUT ROOMS

Breakout rooms aren’t functional until you open them. You can open individual rooms or open all breakout rooms.

Open an individual breakout room

1. Hover your mouse over the breakout room.
2. Click the ellipses.
3. Select Open room.

Open all breakout rooms

1. Click Start rooms.

Teams will open the breakout rooms. Rooms that don’t have any participants assigned will remain closed.

MEETING ORGANIZER OPTIONS

The meeting organizer has control over the main meeting and the breakout rooms. The organizer can join any breakout room, make broadcast announcements, and close breakout rooms.

Join a breakout room (meeting organizer)

1. Hover your mouse over a breakout room.
2. Click the ellipses.
3. Select Join room from the menu.

To leave the breakout room and return to the main meeting, click Return.

MAKE AN ANNOUNCEMENT (MEETING ORGANIZER)

The meeting organizer can send a broadcast announcement to all rooms. This might be reminding participants to return to the main meeting in 2 minutes.

1. At the top of the Breakout rooms pane, click the ellipses.
2. Click Make an announcement.

• Type a message and click Send.

CLOSE BREAKOUT ROOMS

Breakout rooms can be closed once they are no longer needed. Closing a breakout room will return all participants back to the main meeting. It’s a good idea to send an announcement prior to closing asking all participants to finish up the task and return to the meeting.

1. Click Close rooms.

For more Microsoft Teams training, check out the following links:

• Video and Audio Calls in Microsoft Teams
• 10 Steps to Getting Started in Microsoft Teams

Take a look at the Microsoft Teams Full Course on Simon Sez IT

Deborah Ashby

Deborah Ashby is a TAP Accredited IT Trainer, specializing in the design, delivery, and facilitation of Microsoft courses both online and in the classroom.She has over 11 years of IT Training Experience and 24 years in the IT Industry. To date, she's trained over 10,000 people in the UK and overseas at companies such as HMRC, the Metropolitan Police, Parliament, SKY, Microsoft, Kew Gardens, Norton Rose Fulbright LLP.She's a qualified MOS Master for 2010, 2013, and 2016 editions of Microsoft Office and is COLF and TAP Accredited and a member of The British Learning Institute.