Host a webinar

A webinar is run from its live page: its hosts, co-hosts, speakers and moderators present and work there, and attendees watch on their own page, opened from their join link (see Register for a webinar). Live webinars run on the site's own media server. On a site without one, the live page says Live webinars are not available on this site. in place of Go live and Start a test.

Open the live page

On the webinar's page, select Open the live page beside the title. It is offered on a published webinar until it ends, to the members named under Hosts and speakers, whatever their role, and to the team's admins. It becomes the page's main button 30 minutes before the start. Anyone else who opens the live page is told to ask a host to add them.

The live page has the title and a status line, the stage as attendees see it, the controls under the stage, the backstage strip, and a panel with the Chat, Backstage, Q&A and Polls tabs. A speaker's panel has Chat, Backstage and Q&A. The webinar's title in the page bar goes back to its page.

Before the start and backstage

Until 30 minutes before the start, the status line says when the webinar starts and when backstage opens. Before then, the people running it can already write to each other in the backstage chat, under the Backstage tab, and hosts can start a test (see Start a test).

From then, everyone running the webinar who has the live page open is backstage. Backstage, they see and hear each other; attendees and the recording do not. Until backstage opens there is no one to see or hear you, so Microphone and Camera are not shown; Camera and microphone… is there to check them. The backstage strip under the stage has a tile for each person backstage, yours first as You, with their camera or their initials.

Camera and microphone

Microphone and Camera, under the stage, turn each one on and off. Both are off when the page opens, and the browser asks for them the first time you turn one on.

Camera and microphone… opens a drawer to choose the Camera and the Microphone, with a level that moves when you speak, and the Speaker where the browser lets a page choose one. Try screen sharing shows the screen you pick in the drawer only: nobody else sees it. Your choices are remembered in this browser.

Go live

1. Select Go live beside the title. Hosts, co-hosts and team admins have it from 30 minutes before the start.
2. Confirm.

Attendees will see the stage, and the recording will start when Record automatically is on. A host or co-host whose microphone or camera is on will go on the stage with it. The status line will say Live, how long the webinar has been live, how many are watching, and Recording while it records.

Go live is refused from 4 hours after the start: change the webinar's time first. It is also refused while the site is already running as many live webinars as it can at once, and the message says so: try again when one ends.

The plan of Personal or the team sets how many webinars can go live. On the free plan, a webinar cannot go live or run a test. Pro includes 4 live webinars a calendar month, and the Team plan has no limit. A team that still runs on its owner's Pro plan has Pro's limit.

The stage and its layout

The stage shows what attendees and the recording see. While nobody is on it, your page says Attendees see an empty stage.

Attendees see, under the stage, sets the layout. Hosts, co-hosts and team admins can change it:

• People shows everyone on the stage side by side.
• Screen shows a shared screen large, with the people on the stage in a strip beside it. While nobody shares a screen, it shows the people.

When someone starts sharing a screen while the layout is People, it changes to Screen, so attendees and the recording see the screen at once. A host can select People during the share, and the layout then stays as the host chose. When the share stops, the layout goes back to People, unless a host chose a layout during the share.

Up to 10 people can be on the stage at once, counting attendees who were invited onto it and have not answered yet.

Go on and off the stage

Go on stage and Leave the stage, under the stage, put you on it and take you off. While you are on it, attendees and the recording see and hear you.

• Hosts and co-hosts go on the stage when they choose, while the webinar is live or in a test.
• A speaker goes on when a host lets them: turn on Can go on and off the stage on the speaker's row in the Backstage tab. Until then, their page says You can go on the stage once a host lets you.
• A team admin who is not named on the webinar adds themselves as a host on the webinar's page to go on the stage.

The Backstage tab lists who is On the stage, who is Backstage, and the Raised hands. Hosts, co-hosts and team admins have these buttons on other people's rows:

• Bring on stage, on the row of a host, co-host or speaker who is backstage, while the webinar is live or in a test.
• Take off the stage, on a row under On the stage. It also works for someone whose page has closed.
• Mute, on the row of someone on the stage whose microphone is on. Only they can turn it back on.

Share your screen

Share screen asks which screen, window or tab to share, and Stop sharing ends it. Hosts and co-hosts can share without going on the stage. A speaker can share once they are on the stage or a host lets them on it, and an attendee while they are on the stage. Where the browser cannot share a screen, the button is left out.

Attendees and the recording see your screen as soon as you share it: the layout changes to Screen if it was People (see The stage and its layout).

One screen is shared at a time. While someone else is sharing, a host or co-host is asked whether to share theirs instead, which stops the other one; anyone else is told who is sharing, and can share once they stop.

Raised hands and attendees on the stage

While Raise hand is on, attendees can raise a hand to ask to speak. A pre-recorded webinar has no Raise hand: its recording is the stage. The status line of hosts, co-hosts and team admins counts the raised hands: select the count to open the Backstage tab, where Raised hands lists them. Invite to the stage on a row invites that attendee, and the row then says Invited.

The attendee is asked, over their stage, to Join the stage…, where they choose their camera and microphone, or Not now, which lowers their hand. Once on the stage, they have Microphone, Camera, Share screen and Leave the stage, and a host can Take off the stage.

Alert the people on the stage

In the Backstage tab, write a message in the backstage chat and select Alert the people on stage. It will appear over the stage for everyone on it, attendees a host brought on included, until they dismiss it, and stays in the backstage chat. Attendees watching do not see it.

The chat

Chat is the chat everyone watching reads. It opens when the webinar goes live. A message can be up to 2,000 characters, and web addresses in it become links. Messages from the people running the webinar show their role, such as Host.

The Chat switch at the top of the tab turns the chat on and off for attendees. Each message has a menu for hosts, co-hosts, team admins and moderators:

• Pin message shows the message above the chat, in place of any pinned before. Unpin message takes it away.
• Mute {name} in this chat, on an attendee's message, stops them writing in the chat for the rest of the webinar.
• Delete message asks first, then removes the message for everyone.

The backstage chat, under the Backstage tab, is for the people running the webinar only. It works from the time the live page opens until the webinar ends.

Q&A

Attendees ask questions of up to 500 characters in their Q&A tab while the webinar is live and Q&A is on, and vote for the ones they want answered. With Moderate questions on, a question waits for a host or moderator to approve it before other attendees see it. The questions ready for the Q&A, from the webinar's page, are open questions from the start.

Your Q&A tab lists every question, most votes first, under Waiting, Open, Answered and Dismissed, each with a count. A question asked anonymously shows the asker's name to you, marked as anonymous to attendees. Hosts, co-hosts, team admins and moderators have on each question:

• Approve, on a waiting question.
• Show on the stage, which puts the question over the stage for attendees and the recording, with the asker's name unless they asked anonymously, in place of any question shown before. Hide from the stage takes it off.
• In its menu: Answer in writing…, whose answer is shown under the question; Mark as answered live; Merge into another question…, which moves its votes to the question you choose and dismisses it; and Dismiss question, which hides it from attendees.

A speaker reads the same list without these.

Polls

The Polls tab lists the webinar's polls, each with where it stands: Not opened, Open or Closed, with how many answered and, once it has been opened, its results. Add poll adds one, before or during the webinar: a Question, 2 to 8 Options, one per line, and Attendees can choose several when they may. It is added to the webinar's page too.

• Open poll, while the webinar is live, shows the poll to attendees above their tabs. Before then, a test included, the tab says polls can be opened once the webinar is live. Opening a poll while another is open asks first, then closes the other one.
• Close poll asks first. A closed poll cannot be opened again, and its answers are kept.
• Show results on the stage puts the poll's results over the stage for attendees and the recording, and above the attendees' tabs, in place of any shown before. Hide results takes them off. While a poll is open, only its results can be shown.

Attendees can change their answer until the poll closes.

Resources and the call to action

A resource shown From the start is offered in the attendees' Resources tab from the time the webinar goes live. To offer one shown When you show it, choose More, then Show resources…, and select Show on its row. A resource stays offered once it is shown, on the replay page too.

The call to action, set on the webinar's page, is a button under the attendees' stage. While the webinar is live, the stage bar has Show and the button's label, such as Show “Book a call”, to show it, and Hide “Book a call” to take it away. It opens its address in a new tab, and each attendee's first click is counted in the report.

Change the switches during the webinar

More, then During the webinar…, opens the webinar's switches, each saved at once: Chat, Q&A, Moderate questions, Reactions, Raise hand (not in a pre-recorded webinar) and Attendees can see who else is here. Moderators have Chat and Q&A. They are the same switches as the During the webinar band on the webinar's page.

With Attendees can see who else is here on, the watching count in the status line opens Who is here, with the names of the attendees watching.

Record the webinar

With Record automatically on, in the During the webinar band on the webinar's page, the recording starts when the webinar goes live. While it is live, hosts, co-hosts and team admins have Start recording or Stop recording beside the title. Stop recording asks first. Starting again will make a separate recording, listed as its next part.

The recording shows the stage as attendees see it, in the layout chosen, with a question or poll results shown on it. It does not include the backstage, the breakout rooms or the reactions. Nothing is recorded during a test.

If the recording stops or cannot start while the webinar is live, the page says so: select Start recording to try again. What happens to the recording after the webinar is in Webinar recordings, replays and reports.

Start a test

A test tries the stage, the backstage, cameras, microphones and screen sharing before the webinar. Hosts, co-hosts and team admins can select Start a test on the live page, or in More on the webinar's page, at any time on a published webinar before it goes live.

During a test the status line says Test run: attendees cannot see the stage, nothing is recorded, and nothing is counted in the report. The chat, Q&A, polls, the call to action and breakout rooms open only once the webinar is live. End test takes everyone off the stage. Go live ends a test that is still running.

A pre-recorded webinar

Instead of presenting live, a webinar can play one of your own finished Screen Recorder recordings at its start time. In the Live or pre-recorded band on the webinar's page, choose the Recording to play. None: present live goes back to presenting live. The band is shown where the site can play a recording to a webinar.

• The recording becomes private in Screen Recorder: its own link stops working. From Publish until the webinar ends, it cannot be edited or moved to Trash.
• The webinar's length becomes the shortest length that holds the recording, which can be up to 4 hours long. On a published webinar, attendees are emailed the new end.
• From 7 days before the start, Magpie makes the recording ready to play. The band then says Being made ready to play., Ready to play at the start., or Could not be made ready to play. Choose it again, or another one.

At the start time the webinar goes live by itself: there is no Go live button. Every attendee sees the same moment of the recording, so someone who joins late joins where it is. The status line of the people running it says how far it has played. Go on stage, Share screen and the layout are left out, and nothing more is recorded: the replay is the recording itself. The chat, Q&A, polls, resources and the call to action work as in a live webinar, and no host needs to have the live page open. Attendees cannot raise a hand, as nobody goes on the stage. The webinar ends when the recording ends, or when a host selects End webinar.

If the recording is deleted, moved to Trash or cannot be made ready, the hosts and co-hosts will be emailed before the start, and the webinar will not start until another recording is chosen. If it cannot start playing, or stops part-way, they will be emailed too: a webinar that could not start stays scheduled, and one that stopped ends.

End the webinar

End webinar, beside the title while the webinar is live, asks first and cannot be undone. Everyone will leave the stage, open breakout rooms will close, the recording will stop, and attendees will see that the webinar has ended, with Answer the survey when it has an exit survey. Members with edit access then have Open the report beside the title. The follow-up email to attendees is in Webinar recordings, replays and reports.

A webinar nobody ends will end by itself 4 hours after its start.

If your connection drops

When the live page loses the stage, it says Reconnecting…, then keeps trying, with Try now. Reloading the page, or opening it again, puts you back where you were: if you were on the stage, you go back on it, and your microphone and camera come back on where the browser already allows them. Otherwise the stage says You are on the stage with your microphone and camera off.

When you are on the stage and open the live page in another tab, that tab says You are on the stage from another tab or an earlier visit to this page. Use this tab moves you, with your microphone and camera, to it.

When no host, co-host or team admin has had the live page open for 10 minutes, the webinar keeps running for attendees and speakers, and the status line of the people running it says No host is connected. The webinar is still running. When none has had it open for 30 minutes, the webinar will end as if a host had ended it. A pre-recorded webinar plays without a host.

If something else goes wrong, Contact support.