Zoom
Also known as: Zoom meeting, Zoom call, video conferencing
Zoom is a cloud-based video conferencing service that lets people join meetings from a computer, phone, or meeting room system.
It became the dominant platform for video calls during the COVID-19 pandemic. Zoom supports meetings, webinars, phone systems (Zoom Phone), and async video (Zoom Clips). It's popular for external meetings because participants can join without creating an account.
Zoom, explained at three levels
At home
Zoom is the app you use for video calls over the internet. You click a meeting link, your camera and microphone turn on, and you can see and talk to everyone else in the call. You can mute yourself when you're not speaking, share your screen to show a document, and use a virtual background to hide your home environment.
At work
In business, Zoom is commonly used for external meetings (calls with clients, vendors, or job candidates) because participants don't need a company account to join. You just click the link. For internal meetings, many companies use Teams or Meet, but Zoom is often preferred when participants are outside the organization.
At home
Zoom's breakout rooms split a large meeting into smaller groups for workshops or discussions, then bring everyone back together. Reactions (thumbs up, raised hand, clapping) let you respond without interrupting. The Waiting Room holds participants until the host lets them in, useful for keeping a meeting secure until everyone is ready.
At work
Zoom Webinars differ from meetings: webinar attendees are muted by default and can't see each other, making it suitable for large broadcast events. Zoom Phone replaces traditional business phone systems with VoIP calling from the same Zoom app used for meetings. AI Companion can automatically generate meeting summaries and action items from a recorded call.
At home
Zoom's video quality comes from adaptive streaming: each participant sends video in several quality layers, and Zoom's servers forward to each viewer the layer their connection can handle, rather than mixing everything into one stream. When bandwidth drops, Zoom lowers resolution before sacrificing audio, which is why calls stay usable on weak Wi-Fi. End-to-end encryption is optional because turning it on disables cloud recording and some AI features. In my view, that trade-off is worth knowing before you rely on recordings.
At work
Zoom's admin dashboard provides meeting quality analytics (attendee count, join time, audio/video quality per participant), useful for diagnosing connectivity issues. Zoom's REST API allows organizations to automate meeting scheduling, pull attendance reports, and integrate with CRMs so meeting records are logged automatically. Compliance features include end-to-end encryption, meeting data residency, and DLP integrations.
Real-world examples
At home
Sophie's family used Zoom for their weekly Sunday call. Her grandmother joined from a tablet by clicking the link Sophie texted her, no account needed. Sophie enabled the gallery view so everyone could see each other at once, and her niece used a virtual background to appear in front of a beach.
At work
Thomas hosted a 200-person company-wide town hall on Zoom Webinars. Employees joined as attendees (cameras off, muted), submitted questions in the Q&A panel, and Thomas's team moderated which questions got answered live. The webinar was recorded automatically and posted to the intranet the same afternoon.
How it compares
| feature | Zoom | Microsoft Teams | Google Meet |
|---|---|---|---|
| Primary strength | Video quality, ease of use | Microsoft 365 integration | Google Workspace integration |
| Guest access | No account needed | Account or guest link | No account needed |
| Max participants | Up to 1,000 (Enterprise) | Up to 1,000 | Up to 1,000 |
| Persistent chat | Yes (Zoom Team Chat, included) | Full persistent channels | No (Google Chat is separate) |
| Best for | External meetings, webinars | Internal meetings, Microsoft shops | Google Workspace shops |
Zoom is the best choice for external meetings and webinars where guests need frictionless access and video quality is critical. Microsoft Teams wins when you're already in the Microsoft 365 ecosystem and need persistent chat alongside meetings. Google Meet is the natural choice for Google Workspace organizations.
For analysts
Many organizations pay for both Zoom and Teams, running parallel video systems. Before recommending consolidation, check how meetings with external clients work: the no-account-needed advantage of Zoom is often why external-facing teams keep it even when the company has Teams.
History & origin
Zoom was founded by Eric Yuan, a former Cisco WebEx engineer, and launched in 2013. It differentiated itself from WebEx and Skype with simpler UX, better video quality, and the ability for participants to join without creating an account. Zoom went public in 2019, then saw explosive growth during the COVID-19 pandemic: daily meeting participants grew from 10 million in December 2019 to 300 million in April 2020. 'Zoom fatigue' entered the cultural lexicon. Post-pandemic, Zoom expanded into phone (Zoom Phone), AI meeting notes (Zoom AI Companion), and async video (Clips).