Zoom Mesh Explainer

This section provides an overview and introduction to Zoom Mesh and its core concepts.

Overview

Zoom Mesh is a bandwidth optimization feature that redistributes video streams between users within a common local area network.

With Zoom Mesh, supported Zoom Workplace apps can receive webinar and meeting video feeds from other in-network clients as redistribution sources for video content. This can save on external bandwidth consumption by redistributing media within the network instead of requiring each client to establish an independent connection with the Zoom Cloud.

This is most effective with large scale Zoom Meetings or Webinars, like company all-hands or town hall meetings, where thousands of users within the same LAN can virtually attend the same event. With media content redistribution between users across the LAN, bandwidth consumption is minimized.

Zoom Mesh supports video redistribution for Zoom Meetings and Zoom Webinars

Zoom Mesh is supported for both Zoom Meetings and Zoom Webinars (including when used within Zoom Events); however, there are slight variations in media distribution methods between the two products. For more information on these differences, refer to the sections on Zoom Mesh for Meetings Functionality and Zoom Mesh for Webinars Functionality.

Zoom Mesh works by redistributing media streams from parent clients to child clients using peer-to-peer connections

Zoom Mesh is designed to redistribute incoming video streams using a parent-child relationship. In this relationship, parent clients are the local source for video streams that are redistributed to child clients over a peer-to-peer connection.

Parent clients are devices that redistribute data streams to other users within the network

Parent clients are computationally robust devices that can redistribute data streams to other devices (i.e. child clients) within the same network without significantly impacting the device’s performance. Refer to the section on Supported Devices for more information on supported parent clients.

Child clients are devices that receive a redistributed stream from a parent client

A child device is any device that receives a redistributed video stream from a parent client. There are no additional features to this relationship apart from the device’s connection to the parent client. For more information on Zoom Mesh relationships, refer to the section on Parent-Child Functionality.

Zoom Mesh support is built into desktop Zoom Workplace apps and does not require any additional hardware or software

Zoom Mesh is a Zoom Workplace desktop app-native feature and is ready to use after a supported Zoom app version has been installed on a device. Unlike most enterprise content delivery networks (eCDN), Zoom Mesh does not require any additional software, hardware, websites, or workflows to use.

Unlike third-party eCDN integrations, Zoom Mesh provides a consistent user experience with full client feature access

Unlike integrations with third-party eCDN solutions like Hive or Kollective, users connected to a meeting or webinar through Zoom Mesh maintain a consistent client experience, retaining access to client-dependent features like Q&A, Chat, Polling, and being promoted to a panelist during the session. Third-party eCDN solutions often require users to join events through proprietary software or web browsers, which introduce new workflows and make these features unavailable.

Zoom Mesh includes a robust dashboard for mesh network diagnostics and a web portal interface for customized settings

Admins or authorized users can access a robust Zoom Mesh dashboard that includes ongoing and historical Zoom Mesh statistical information for the account. Data provided includes a Mean Opinion Score (MOS) rating, bandwidth saved, information on Mesh parent and child clients, health warnings, average CPU utilization, and more.

Zoom Mesh additionally includes web portal settings for customizing a mesh network. Customization options include location, public IP, and subnet definition, statically assigned parent and child clients, and parent client eligibility rules. For more information, refer to the section on the Zoom Mesh Dashboard.

Zoom Mesh Functionality

Zoom Mesh Functionality

Failover Scenarios

The following sections detail Zoom Mesh behavior in failover scenarios.

If a primary parent client connection is lost, the expected failover time is approximately one tenth of a second

In the event a user loses connection to the primary parent client, the user’s device will establish a failover connection to the secondary parent client. This failover is expected to take less than one-tenth of a second on average, with a negligible interruption to the user experience.

If all parent clients fail, users will failover to the Zoom Cloud in low bandwidth mode

In the unlikely event that all parent clients within a mesh network fail within a short period of time, all users will failover to the Zoom Cloud in low bandwidth mode until the Cloud Orchestration Service can rebuild the mesh network.

Low bandwidth mode attempts to maintain session connectivity while using as little bandwidth as necessary to avoid overwhelming the network with a surge of new connections. Until the mesh network is rebuilt and users fallback to parent-child relationships, each user will consume approximately 300 Kbps.

If a mesh network can't be created, users will connect to the event normally

If a user connects to an event and the Cloud Orchestration Service (COS) cannot locate a suitable parent client, or if the user is not within a mesh network, the user will connect to the event through the Zoom Cloud.

Grant Custom User Roles Access to Zoom Mesh

All administrators have access to Zoom Mesh account settings by default, but custom roles can be created with defined access permissions.

1. As a Zoom account owner or admin authorized to edit roles, navigate to the Role Management page on the web portal.

2. Click the pencil icon to the right of the role you are editing.

3. Navigate to the Advanced Features subsection and define the role access for Zoom Mesh as desired.

4. Repeat for any additional roles.

Zoom Mesh Dashboard

Zoom Mesh Dashboard

Network and Firewall Considerations

Zoom Mesh utilizes Zoom’s standard network firewall and proxy configuration list for inbound traffic. However, some customers may require additional rules permitting in-network traffic between client devices. The following table specifies client traffic requirements for Zoom Mesh within a network:

Transport	Destination Port	Source IP	Destination IP	Purpose
TCP	443	Local Zoom Client	Zoom Cloud	Authentication and Meeting Join
TCP	443	Local Zoom Client	Zoom Cloud	Client Signaling
UDP	8801	Local Zoom Client	Zoom Cloud	Client Media
TCP	443	Local Zoom Client	Zoom Cloud	Client Media Fallback
TCP	18801-19800	Local Zoom Client	Parent / Child	Mesh Control
UDP	18801-19800	Local Zoom Client	Parent / Child	Mesh Media
UDP	36699	Local Zoom Client	Local Subnet	Mesh Discovery (Multicast to 224.1.1.1)

Note

Port separation for media (UDP 8801-8803) is supported. Adjust UDP/8801 rules to include 8802 and 8803 if port separation is enabled.

Multicast is used within the network segment for discovery. Multicast routing is not required for operation, but is recommended.

Supported Devices

The following client versions are eligible to be parent or child clients; however, Zoom recommends using the latest version for best results

Platform	Version
Windows	5.13
MacOS	5.13
Linux	5.13
VDI (Plug-In Required)	5.14

The following clients are only eligible to be child clients:

Platform	Version
iOS	5.13
Android	5.13

Note

Due to Zoom’s Software Quarterly Lifecycle Policy, all Zoom Workplace desktop apps should now support Zoom Mesh. This list is retained to specify which iterations of the apps (i.e., mobile, desktop, etc.) are supported.