Meeting scheduling: access and security options

Beyond title, time, and visibility, the meeting Schedule form has a set of access and security options that apply to every meeting kind. This article covers those options; for scheduling basics, roles, and host controls, see Scheduling and running meetings.

Access options

While scheduling, under Options, you can turn on:

• Waiting Room — participants are held and admitted manually instead of joining straight in.
• Passcode — requires a numeric code from external guests and public-link joiners before they're admitted. A random passcode is generated for you; you can regenerate it or copy it to share separately from the invite link. Org members joining from inside the workspace aren't prompted for it — they're already authenticated as part of your team.
• Screen Sharing — choose whether anyone, only hosts, or (for a webinar) only speakers can share their screen.

Video and chat defaults

• Host Video / Participant Video — whether hosts and participants start the call with their camera on or off. Everyone can still turn their own camera on or off once they've joined.
• Chat — who can use in-call chat: everyone, hosts and speakers only, or disabled.
• Recording — allow the meeting to be recorded. This is the setting that has to be on for a town hall's replay to exist afterward.

Webinar-only settings

Setting Meeting Type to Webinar (available for any meeting kind, and the way to get the full town-hall experience — see Running a town hall) unlocks two more toggles:

• Q&A — viewers can submit and upvote questions during the call. Turning it off hides the Q&A panel for everyone in that webinar.
• Floor Control — hosts manage who can speak. Turning it off hides the floor control panel from hosts in that webinar.

Both are on by default, and both apply only to webinars. Older webinars scheduled before these switches existed behave as though both are on.

There is no auto-mute setting. Anyone can mute themselves at any time, and a host can mute participants from the host controls panel during the call.

Why this matters

Not every meeting needs the same level of control. A quick internal sync doesn't need a passcode or a waiting room; a public town hall usually benefits from both. Setting these options at scheduling time means you don't have to manage access mid-call — the meeting is already configured the way you need it before anyone joins.