Teams live event and webinar

Live event

Teams live events provides the possibility to organise online events for up to 20 000 viewers. The events themselves are similar to lectures and differ significantly from a regular Teams meeting, as viewers can only watch the event and ask questions via a Q&A section. Viewers can not communicate with each other, nor can they disturb the event as they can not be heard. The questions asked in the Q&A section are also submitted for approval before they are published for everyone to see, meaning that the organizers can dismiss inappropriate questions, or answer them in private. Teams Live Events will be retired in September 2024, Teams Town Hall will replace Live events.

Quick guide

Creating the event

1. Open the Teams calendar. Next to the New meeting button there is a drop-down menu where the Live event can be selected
2. Fill in the basic information about the event and add the Producers/Presenters. The event can be organised with only one Producer. Do not add the attendees/viewers at this stage.
3. Define who can watch the event: specific Persons/Groups, members of our organisation (TUNI), or available for everyone.
4. Activate Q&A if needed, and decide if the viewers are later allowed to view the recording of the event.
5. When the event is created, take a copy of the attendee-link. Attendees use this link to watch the event. The link can be attached to a regular calendar event via Outlook, or copied to a Moodle-page.

Additional instructions by Microsoft

1. Get started with Microsoft Teams live events
    
2. Schedule a Teams live event
    
3. Invite attendees to a Teams live event
    
4. Produce a live event using Teams
    
5. Participate in a Q&A in a live event in Teams
    
6. Manage a live event recording and reports in Teams

Teams webinar

The Teams webinar is open to 1,000 participants. Webinar participants register for the event. This option is not available at Teams meetings or Teams live events.

The webinar organiser will schedule the webinar, prepare the registration form and send a webinar invitation to the presenters. After this, the registration link for the participants is activated and the organiser can share the webinar information and the registration link with the participants. The webinar organiser will be able to download a registration report of the participants before the webinar and an attendance report after the webinar.

In the webinar, presenters will be able to control audience participation in the event, for example, interactivity or live reactions. In the Teams webinar, small group rooms are also available, as long as there are no more than 300 participants. Also chat is available in the Teams webinar.

Get started with Teams webinars - Microsoft Support

Teams town hall

The town hall is a meeting type available in Teams. It allows you to create a meeting for a large audience. The town hall can have up to 10,000 participants (or up to 20,000 if using Teams Premium).

Features and benefits of the town hall in Teams:

• You can create and join the town hall just like any other Teams meeting. You don't need to install a separate application.
• You can use all the familiar tools and functions of Teams, such as chat, reactions, polls and whiteboard.
• You can choose whether you want to organize the gathering internally, externally or even for both. An internal meeting is only for members of your organization, while an external meeting is open to anyone with a meeting link.
• You can control who can participate, speak and share their screen in the meeting. You can also block disruptive participants who violate the rules of the meeting.
• You can save and share the town hall recording within your organization or, if you wish, also outside. You can also add subtitles and translation to the recording to make it more accessible.
• You can measure the success of the town hall with reports that show the number of participants, participation rate, viewer engagement and feedback.

With Town hall, you can therefore keep in touch, communicate and collaborate with the general public in Teams efficiently and securely. 

Links to Microsoft instructions:

• Get started with town hall in Microsoft Teams
• Schedule a town hall in Microsoft Teams
• Attend a town hall in Microsoft Teams

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