How to Set Up and Use Breakout Rooms in a Microsoft Teams Meeting

You want to break a Teams meeting into smaller groups so people can talk in separate rooms, then bring everyone back.

Why: Breakout rooms let an organizer move participants into side rooms with their own audio and chat. Only the organizer (or a presenter in the organizer’s organization) can create and manage them, and this works in the desktop Teams app on Windows or Mac.

Step 1: Create the rooms during the meeting

1. In your meeting controls, select Rooms.
2. Choose the number of rooms you want (up to 50).
3. Choose how you want participants assigned — Automatically (Teams splits people evenly) or Manually (you place each person).
4. Select Create rooms.

To add more later, select Rooms → Add room.

Step 2: Assign participants

If you chose manual assignment, or want to adjust the automatic split:

1. Select Rooms, then Assign participants.
2. Tick the people you want, then choose the room to place them in.
3. Confirm to save the assignments.

Plan ahead: you won’t be able to automatically assign people to rooms later in the meeting, so set automatic assignment up front if you want Teams to balance the groups for you.

Step 3: Open and close the rooms

1. To start all groups at once, select Rooms → Open rooms. Participants are moved into their assigned room automatically.
2. To open just one room, hover over it, select More options, then Open.
3. To bring everyone back, select Rooms → Close rooms (or hover over a single room → More options → Close).
4. A room has finished closing when its status changes to Closed; participants then return to the main meeting.

FAQ

The Rooms button is missing. Breakout rooms can only be created by the organizer or a presenter in the organizer’s org, and only in the desktop app — they’re not available on web or mobile for setup.

Can I set rooms up before the meeting? Yes. In your Calendar, open the meeting, select More options → Breakout rooms, and pre-create and pre-assign rooms before it starts.

Can participants move between rooms themselves? Only if the organizer turns on the setting that lets people return to the main meeting or move freely; otherwise they stay in the room you assigned until you move them.

Sources: Microsoft Support — Manage breakout rooms in Microsoft Teams