Question about what constitutes a "host"

[Jack6128]

At the "Roles in a meeting" page on the Zoom website I read the following "Host: The user that scheduled the meeting. They have full permissions to manage the meeting. There can only be one host of a meeting."

My question is, what constitutes "The user that scheduled the meeting"? This is my understanding of that statement: If a "user" signs into a Zoom account with a specific email and password, and schedules a meeting, the "user" is the specific email and password, not the actual person who typed in the scheduled meeting. Later, if a different person signs on to that same account and starts the meeting, that person is the host. So it is the person who STARTS the meeting, not necessarily the person who SCHEDULES the meeting who is the host, as long as the person who starts the meeting signs in with the same email and password as the person who scheduled the meeting. In other words the Zoom software only cares about the specific email and password used to schedule and start a meeting and cares nothing for the person who typed in the specific email and password, or from which device.

If this is correct, I have another follow-up question. I know it is possible to allow participants to join before the host. In fact, if this parameter is set, the host need never show up, and the participants can meet for as long as the specific account allows. My question is this: is it possible for the person who schedules a meeting, at the time of scheduling, to assign another participant who will later be in that meeting to be either co-host or alternative host at that meeting which the scheduler will not attend, and which no one will sign in with the same email and password under which the meeting was scheduled?

Thanks

Jack

[Jack6128]

Please ignore this reply

[Bort]

1. Correct, the user profile that created/scheduled the meeting is the original host of the meeting. If they start or join a meeting that they scheduled, they will automatically be given the host controls in the meeting. These host controls can be passed to others in the meeting, but that does not change who the actual original host is, just who currently has host controls. 
2. It is possible to specify another user to be the Alternative Host, which allows that user to start the meeting in place of the original host, instantly giving them host controls to the meeting (but they are still not the original host). Unfortunately, this cannot be assigned to any random participant, as it can only be assigned to another licensed user on the same Zoom account. 

Hope that helps and please make sure to mark the solution as accepted if this information is what you needed.

[Jack6128 · Accepted solution]

Thank you, Bort. Yes, that answered my question! I am deducing from what I have learned through reading and actual experience with Zoom that it is possible for a Zoom meeting to take place in which no form of host is ever present. Is this correct? Thanks again, Bort. I really appreciate your help.

Jack

[Bort]

Correct, the host only needs to schedule the meeting and share the invitation info. Beyond that, if the meeting was scheduled a particular way, ie waiting room disabled and join before host enabled, then the actual live meeting does not actually need a host present, although some features and capabilities will be lost due to no host being present.