Environment
Zoom
Issue
What is the difference between an Alternative Host and a Co-Host in Zoom?
Resolution
Co-Host (Role that only exists once a meeting has started)
- A Co-Host can be created by the host of the meeting once the meeting has started
- Anyone in the meeting after it starts, regardless of their Zoom instance or relation to the University, can be made a co-host by the host of the meeting
Alternative Host (Role that only exists before a meeting)
- Alternative Host is an option to be set when someone creates a Zoom meeting
- The main role of the Alternative Host is to be someone that can start the meeting for the host if it is needed
- If the Alternative Host starts the meeting instead of the host, then the Alternative Host becomes the Host of the meeting
- If the Host (meeting creator) ends up joining the meeting later, they will regain host control and the Alternative Host will be bumped to a co-host role if it is enabled
- If there are multiple alternative hosts, only the first one to join will become host, the others will become co-hosts if the role is enabled
- You can only add people in your own instance of Zoom as an Alternative Host
- There are no exceptions to this
- For U-M, this means they must have U-M Zoom access
Additional Information
There has been a lot of confusion around this. At this point, we are confident that Alternative Hosts will become Co-Hosts in a meeting.
https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/208220166-Alternative-host
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