Using tiered settings

Tiered settings provide a hierarchical way to manage the settings that affect meetings, webinars, and audio conferences. The settings can be controlled at the account, group, and user levels so that events throughout the organization have enforced settings when required, while allowing meeting and webinar organizers the flexibility to customize other settings.

This article covers:

• How to use tiered settings for new accounts
• How to use tiered settings for existing accounts
• How to manage tiered settings
  • Managing default settings
  • Locking settings
  • Managing conflicting settings
  • Primary groups

How to use tiered settings for new accounts

Note: If you signed up for a new Zoom account after August 21, 2021; or the New Admin Experience is enabled on your account, the Group Management page has been renamed to Groups.

If you are configuring your Zoom account for the first time:

1. Sign in to the Zoom web portal as an administrator with the privilege to edit account settings.
2. In the navigation menu, click Account Management then Account Settings.
3. Determine if the default values for any settings need to be changed. See Managing default settings for details. Any change affects all groups and users in the account.
4. To provide maximum control, click the lock icon to the right of the setting name. This prevents groups or individuals from changing the setting. See Locking settings for details.
5. To provide maximum flexibility to groups and individuals, leave the lock icon open. This allows different groups to have different settings, and to lock those settings for members of their groups.
6. If your organization uses Group Settings, determine whether any of the groups need to have different settings from the default values that you set for the account.
7. For each group that requires different settings, in the navigation menu, click User Management then Groups. 
8. Click the applicable group name from the list.
9. Update any setting that was not locked at the account level.
   Making changes at the group level affects all members of that group. If a member of your account belongs to multiple groups with different settings, the settings that apply to that member is described below in Managing conflicting settings.

How to use tiered settings for existing accounts

Any settings that you or a member of your account changed from the default will remain in its updated state in the following locations:

• Account Settings
• Group Management
• User (personal) Settings

How to manage tiered settings

Managing default settings

Most settings are controlled individually rather than as a group, with each option controlled by its own toggle. If you enable a setting at the account level, that becomes the default setting for all groups and users in the account unless the setting had been previously disabled by a group or user.

For example, the Immersive View feature is disabled by default. Suppose you had previously enabled this feature, but some of the users in your account disabled it. By default, all members of the account will have this option enabled, except for any of the users who had previously disabled it. The option will remain disabled for those users, unless you lock the setting.

Locking settings

Each setting can be locked at either the account level or the group level. Locking a setting at the account level means that the setting cannot be changed at the group or user level. Locking the setting at the group level means that members of the group cannot change the setting.

For example, suppose you want to allow all users in your account to use the Immersive View feature, and prevent them from disabling it. Since this setting is disabled by default, you must do the following:

1. Sign in to the Zoom web portal as an administrator with the privilege to edit account settings.
2. In the navigation menu, click Account Management then Account Settings.
3. Click the Meeting tab.
4. Under In Meeting (Advanced), click the Immersive View toggle to enable it.
5. If a verification dialog appears, click Enable to verify the change.
6. Click the lock icon , and then click Lock to confirm the setting.
   Immersive view will be enabled for all account members, including groups.

However, suppose you want to allow only the users in the Engineering group to use the Immersive View feature, and you want members of other groups to have the choice about whether to enable or disable this setting. You must do the following:

1. Sign in to the Zoom web portal as an administrator with the privilege to edit account settings.
2. In the navigation menu, click Account Management then Account Settings.
3. Click the Meeting tab.
4. Under In Meeting (Advanced), click the Immersive View toggle to enable it.
5. If a verification dialog appears, click Enable to verify the change. The setting will be enabled for all members of your account.
   Note: Do not lock this setting at the account level, since that would prevent any users in your organization from being allowed to disable it.
6. In the navigation menu, click User Management then Groups.
7. Click the name of the group (in this example, you would click the name of the Engineering group), then click the Meeting tab.
8. Under In Meeting (Advanced), verify that Immersive View is enabled.
9. Click the lock icon , and then click Lock to confirm the setting.  
   For members of your account who are in the Engineering group, the Immersive View option will immediately be grayed out and cannot be switched off. All meetings and webinars for these group members will have the option to use the Immersive View feature.
   For members of your account who are not in the Engineering group, the Immersive View option will be enabled, but will not be locked. Meetings and webinars for these members will have the option to use the Immersive View feature by default, but the member has the ability to disable this option completely.  

Managing conflicting settings

If an individual is a member of multiple groups, and the settings for those groups conflict with each other, the precedence is given to settings that are locked. For settings that are locked in different positions in multiple groups, precedence is given based on the order in which the user was added to the group.

For example, suppose an organization has a group named Contractors, and then later creates a group named Engineers. The following tables show the setting for an employee named John who is a member of both Contractors and Engineers.

Although John joined the Contractors group first, his setting will be locked off, since locked settings take precedence.

Since the settings for both groups are locked in conflicting positions, John’s setting is locked on because John was added to the Contractors group prior to being added to the Engineers group.

Since neither of the settings are locked, John’s setting is the same as the Contractors, since John was added to the Contractors group prior to being added to the Engineers group.

Primary groups

If a user is in multiple groups, an admin can set a primary group for users. The user will use the primary group's settings by default. However, if settings are locked in other groups, those settings will be locked for that user. By default, the primary group is the first group that user is added to. Learn how to manage groups and set a group as primary.