Zoom Webinars at Pepperdine

Overview

Pepperdine University automatically provides all active faculty and staff with a Zoom Meeting license supporting up to 500 participants, as well as a Zoom Webinar license for hosting online events for up to 500 participants. Current students receive a Zoom Meeting license for up to 300 participants, but do not receive a Zoom Webinar license.

Faculty and staff requiring a large-capacity webinar license to host University business events for 501 to 3,000 participants may submit a formal request to use the University’s large-capacity webinar license.

Important: Due to limited availability of the large-capacity license (up to 3,000 participants), Pepperdine will evaluate requests on a case-by-case basis using a first-come, first-served approach. Requests must be made at least five business days prior to the event and can be canceled at any time without notice due to needs from University leadership and emergencies. Please see our currently scheduled webinars for license availability. If your webinar request is approved, you will receive an email with the webinar details and the link to start your webinar.

Accessibility Reminder: Zoom offers live closed captioning. If closed captioning is needed, please enable closed captioning by clicking “more” and “show captions.”

Request Zoom Webinar (Large Capacity)

Calendar of Currently Scheduled Webinars

Compare Zoom Meetings and Webinars

Zoom Meetings provide a flexible solution that satisfies most standard needs for instruction, collaboration, and general gatherings. Faculty and staff can host up to 500 participants, while students can accommodate up to 300 participants. Hosts maintain full administrative control, including the ability to mute attendees, restrict screen sharing, and manage chat options. Additionally, Zoom Meetings support breakout rooms, a capability not currently available in webinars.

Zoom Webinars are designed specifically for structured information sessions rather than collaborative interaction. Default capacity for faculty and staff covers up to 500 participants, with expansion up to 3,000 participants by request. Webinars restrict video, audio, and screen sharing exclusively to designated panelists while providing built-in Q&A features.

**Zoom Meetings vs. Webinars**
Feature	Meetings (Students)	Meetings (Fac/Staff)	Webinars (Fac/Staff Only)
Participants	300	500	500 or 3000*
Availability	All Students	All Faculty & Staff	All Faculty & Staff
Audio & Video	All participants	All participants	Host and panelists**
Screen sharing	All participants***	All participants***	Host and panelists only
Chat	All participants	All participants	All participants†
Q&A	Available††	Available††	Available
Participant List	All participants	All participants	Host and panelists only
File Transfer	Available	Available	Not available
Breakout Rooms	Available	Available	Not available
Nonverbal Feedback	Multiple options	Multiple options	Raise hand only

* All faculty and staff automatically receive a Webinar 500 license. Requests to use the large-capacity license (up to 3,000 participants) are evaluated on an individual basis.

**In Zoom meetings, hosts and co-hosts can mute all attendees upon entry and disable the ability for attendees to unmute themselves. In Zoom webinars, all participants are muted by default. The hosts and panelists may selectively enable audio for specific attendees.

*** In Zoom meetings, screen sharing is restricted to the host by default, though access can be extended to any participant. In Zoom webinars, screen sharing is strictly reserved for hosts and panelists.

† In both Zoom meetings and Zoom webinars, chat tools can be customized to allow or limit chat options for participants or entirely turned off through account settings.

†† Users must enable the Q&A feature in the user settings to use this feature.

Learn how to use Zoom Webinars

Want to learn more? Please sign up for a Zoom live training or refer to these Zoom help guides:

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