GoTo Meeting is an online meeting service from GoTo for video calls, screen presentations and team discussions. Organizers host from the desktop app or a browser. Attendees can join through the browser on Windows, macOS, Linux and Chrome OS, through the desktop app, or through the iOS and Android apps. A free plan covers short meetings with a few people; paid plans add longer meetings, recording and larger audiences.
Starting and scheduling meetings
An organizer can start an instant meeting or create a one-time or recurring meeting in advance. While setting it up, the organizer picks a schedule, adds a co-organizer and sets a password. The organizer also edits audio options, enables breakout rooms and decides whether attendees may start the meeting without the host. New meetings appear in the Upcoming or Rooms tab with the invitation ready to copy or add to a calendar.
A personal meeting room gives the organizer a fixed link and meeting ID that stay the same from one session to the next. Users can also launch GoTo Meeting from Outlook, Slack, Chrome, Salesforce and Microsoft Teams. The built-in business messaging lets a chat conversation turn into a meeting with one click. An organizer hosts one session at a time, and every meeting is capped at eight hours.
Ways to join and connect audio
Attendees join by link in Chrome or Edge without installing anything, or through the GoTo Meeting desktop and mobile apps. A webcam preview checks the camera and connection before entry. Audio runs over the computer (VoIP) or by phone, with dial-in numbers in many countries. The Call Me option has GoTo Meeting ring the participant’s phone when the meeting begins.
On mobile, Commuter Mode turns the phone screen into a single color-coded mute button and cuts bandwidth use sharply. In the meeting, participants use chat, reactions and a raised hand, and can replace their background behind the webcam.
Screen sharing and presenter tools
The presenter shares the entire screen or a single application window. A preview before sharing offers to include media sound (from a browser or the Windows desktop app). It also offers to show the GoTo interface itself or optimize for video, which lowers resolution to keep motion smooth. The presenter can pause or resume sharing, or switch it to another screen. Mobile users can broadcast their own screen from the app, except in password-protected meetings.
The organizer can make any attendee the presenter from the People pane. The desktop app adds shared keyboard and mouse control, so a presenter can let a guest operate the shared computer.
Drawing on shared content
Drawing tools let the presenter mark up slides and documents during the presentation. These tools include a pen with selectable color and transparency, a highlighter and a spotlight pointer. Annotations can be cleared at once or set to fade automatically. Drawing requires the desktop app; other attendees draw once they receive remote control or sharing rights.
Breakout rooms for smaller groups
When a meeting is scheduled with breakout rooms, the organizer can split attendees into as many as 50 rooms. The organizer can start breakouts more than once during the session. The organizer and co-organizers stay in the main room, can enter any room, and can send a chat message to all rooms at the same time. Attendees press an Assistance icon to call the organizer over. Breakout participants need computer audio, and the feature is not part of the Free plan.
Recordings and transcripts
GoTo Meeting records either to the cloud or to the organizer’s computer, depending on what the account admin allows. Cloud recordings capture webcams and audio and appear automatically in the web account after the meeting, ready to manage and share. Local recordings save as a G2M file that the classic app converts to MP4 or, on Windows, WMV.
With cloud recording and transcription both enabled, each recorded meeting gets an English transcript stored next to the video. The organizer can view the two side by side or separately and see talk time and attendees. The organizer can also search for keywords, filter the text to one speaker and turn on captions for playback. Other options include copying or downloading the transcript and sharing a link with an expiry date.
Smart Meeting Assistant
GoTo Meeting’s Smart Meeting Assistant transcribes automatically, marks highlights and picks out action items. It also collects the slides shown during a meeting, in order, into a single shareable PDF.
Meeting security controls
Screen-sharing data, keyboard and mouse control and chat travel over TLS and are stored with AES 256-bit encryption, while video and audio use SRTP. The organizer can require a meeting password and lock the meeting once it starts so new guests wait for approval. The organizer can also remove an unknown attendee with one click. Password-protected meetings cannot be recorded.
Lifting the 40-minute meeting limit
The GoTo Meeting Free plan allows meetings of up to 40 minutes with up to three participants, including screen sharing, webcams, VoIP audio and chat. Paid plans remove the time limit and add phone dial-in, co-organizers, recording and integrations. They raise the participant cap to 150 on Professional and 250 on Business.
