How to Confidently Stream Group Calls (3+ people) in 1080p?

[barrett1]

Hello!

I have a pro plan and I want to stream group calls in 1080p. This is a big deal to me and my business. And I feel that it is to a lot of others. Yet I find it head-scratching how difficult, unclear and at times contradictory (at least to my level of understanding) the information on how to do this is. If it were as simple as upgrading to business, okay, great. But it doesn't appear to be.

Going from 360p to 1080p is a big, big difference. And it's a pretty big deal for professionals using Zoom who rely on video streaming for their businesses.

Yet the information on how to reliably stream at 1080p doesn't appear to be listed or touched on at all in the 'plans and pricing' page (am I wrong?).

And there seems to be a lot of information on people upgrading or tweaking settings to get to stream at 1080p and then finding out they're still continuing to stream at the same quality (this also applies to people trying to move from 360p/etc. to 720p).

**I tried to test if my streaming quality increased after going to my zoom meeting settings in my browser and toggling on 'meeting hd video quality'. But when I go and start a new meeting to see if anything has changed, (video settings -> statistics -> video ->resolution)--it shows me no information at all. Perhaps that's because I'm in a test meeting alone? Who knows. Can't find the answer to this online either.

So I'm looking for a clear, straightforward answer: if I'm on a device that can shoot video in 1080, how can I stream group calls in 1080p? 

And yes, I know that quality can apparently be effected by people joining that can't support 720/1080. But *minimally* how can my recordings of these calls be in 1080p?

Apologies for sounding harsh, this is just really frustrating and I'm a little at a loss here.

[NoSafety]

First things first - you should upgrade to Business license 😄 With Pro you can get 720p at most.

There is a support article about this (it's called Group HD in Zoom).

https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0066166 

There are also other requirements like bandwidth or layout mode, but it's all in that article.

[Ray_Harwood]

Welcome to the Zoom Community, @barrett1.

There’s a lot of information on the Zoom Support web site, and I agree it can be frustrating to find what you want, and some of the information you do find can be difficult to understand without an in-depth knowledge of Zoom and a lot of Zoom experience. That’s why Champions like me are here!!

First of all, read this Zoom Support article, if you haven’t already:

https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0066166 

While @NoSafety is correct – that going to a Business license will get you direct access to 1080 video – a Business license requires you to have 10 paid user accounts. This is an expensive requirement if you are a solo event producer like me and many of my colleagues!  A Pro account can easily be enabled for 720.

Remember that the resolution we’re talking about only applies to the individual user camera video. Screen Sharing is always streamed at native resolution – provided the bandwidth will support it.  And the 1080 video is only generated under certain circumstances (read the article above).  If everyone is looking at a gallery view and there are 49 people on the call, there’s absolutely no need to be clogging up the bandwidth with 49 1080p streams when there’s less than 154 pixels available to display. Use the Settings -> Statistics -> Video tab to watch what happens as you switch between Gallery and Speaker/Pin modes. Your received resolution will change accordingly.

There is no video transmission when you are in a meeting by yourself. The Zoom app makes intelligent use of bandwidth – and if you’re the only attendee, there’s no need to be sending your video back to the Zoom servers. 

Hopefully this helps a little. If you have specific detailed questions, let me know. 

[barrett1]

Ray, Thanks for your quick reply and guidance. The 10 licenses required for a business account is a deal breaker. Another frustrating turn! Haha.

I've read the full Zoom Support article and enabled Group HD video (or what's listed on my end as' 'Meeting HD Video Quality') everywhere (again, I'm on a Pro plan). Yet the highest quality I'm getting is 640p.

I've tested on mobile (iphone 11pro) and on desktop (dell xps 15/webcam of 720p).
I've toggled through speaker and gallery mode.
My upload speed is 9.90 Mbps.

640 is as high as I'm getting! Any thoughts are welcome! Thank you!