Need to split your Google Meet into smaller groups? Breakout rooms are your answer. In an active Meet call, just click Activities > Breakout rooms. Pick how many rooms you need, toss people in manually or let Meet shuffle them around, then hit Open rooms. (The host can pop into any room and pull everyone back to the main session when it’s time.)
What's Happening
As of 2026, this feature is live on both the web and mobile apps—but only for Google Workspace customers on the Education Plus, Teaching and Learning Upgrade, Enterprise Standard, or Enterprise Plus plans. Free Google accounts? No breakout rooms for you.
The host handles everything: making rooms, moving people around, and keeping time. Meanwhile, participants can raise hands, share screens, and chat inside their rooms. Teachers and meeting organizers swear by this for running small-group discussions, workshops, or team projects without jumping to another tool.
Step-by-Step Solution
Start or join a Google Meet call as the host.
In the Meet toolbar, click Activities—that’s the puzzle-piece icon.
Pick Breakout rooms. A sidebar pops up with two choices: Assign participants automatically or Assign participants manually.
Choose how many rooms you need (up to 100 rooms and 250 participants on supported plans as of 2026).
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Action How to do it Auto-assign Click Shuffle to let Meet randomly split everyone. Drag names to tweak the groups if you want. Manual assign Turn off Shuffle. Click a participant’s tile, hold, drag, and drop them into any room. Want a timer? Set one (default’s 5 minutes). Click Start when you’re ready.
To jump into a room, just click its name in the sidebar. To end breakout time, click Close rooms.
Participants can call for help: in their room, they click Ask for help, which pings the host.
If This Didn’t Work
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Check your plan. Breakout rooms need a Google Workspace account on Education Plus, Teaching and Learning Upgrade, Enterprise Standard, or Enterprise Plus as of 2026. Free accounts don’t get this feature.
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Update Meet. On mobile, hit the Play Store or App Store, search “Google Meet,” and install any updates. On the web, clear your browser cache or switch browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, or Safari all work).
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Host-only access. Only the meeting organizer can create breakout rooms. Not the host? Ask the organizer to start them for you.
Prevention Tips
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Test breakout rooms ahead of time. Start a quick Meet with a coworker, make a room, and confirm you can join and close it.
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Send a one-line guide to participants. Something like “Click Activities → Breakout rooms to join your group” cuts down on confusion.
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Use the timer to keep things moving. A visible countdown helps people wrap up and return on schedule.
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Turn on live captions during breakouts. In Meet’s settings (the gear icon), enable captions so even if the audio’s a little rough in small rooms, everyone can still follow along.
