BYOM, or “Bring Your Own Meeting“, is a meeting room setup where people join the call from their own laptop, on whatever platform they need, while using the room’s camera, mics and screen. Teams for the weekly team sync, Zoom for a client, Google Meet for a partner: the room simply works with all of them. It’s a popular choice for companies that host a lot of visitors or juggle several collaboration tools. But it isn’t the right fit for every room, and the trade-offs are worth understanding before you roll it out across your workplace.
Key takeaways
BYOD (“Bring Your Own Device”) is all about content. You put your laptop, tablet or phone screen up on the room display, wired or wireless. There may not be a video call at all.
BYOM takes things further. Your laptop runs the meeting: it hosts the call and taps into the room’s camera, mics and speakers as if they were plugged straight into it.
A native room has its own built-in compute and runs a dedicated platform, typically Microsoft Teams Rooms or Zoom Rooms. You start the meeting from a touch panel on the table, and nobody needs to bring a laptop.
| Mode | What the user does | Platforms | Laptop needed? |
|---|---|---|---|
| BYOD | Shares their screen on the room display | N/A | Yes, or a phone |
| BYOM | Starts their own call using the room’s camera, mics and display | Any | Yes |
| Native room | Joins from the in-room touch panel | One native platform, sometimes two | No |
The way we meet has changed a lot in the past decade. According to Microsoft, 57% of meetings are now ad hoc calls with no calendar invite, and close to a third involve people in different time zones (source: Microsoft Work Trend Index, “Breaking down the infinite workday”, June 2025).
Remote work only adds to the pressure. Figures from Insee, France’s national statistics agency, show that 26% of employees worked remotely in 2023, up from 9% in 2019 (source: Insee). When teams are spread out and everyone you work with has their own preferred tool, a room that only supports one platform soon gets in the way.
The simplest setup is a single USB-C cable or hub between the laptop and the room. Plug in once, and the laptop sends video to the display and picks up the camera, mics and speakers. Video bars from Logitech, Poly and Yealink all support USB mode, which is why they sit at the heart of so many BYOM rooms. Our roundup of the best video bars breaks down which models suit which room sizes.
Wireless BYOM gets rid of the cable altogether. Users connect to the room through a wireless dongle or presentation app. Barco helped make this mainstream with ClickShare, which lets laptops use the room’s camera and mics without plugging anything in. Kramer offers wireless presentation and collaboration through its VIA range.
Going wireless also makes handovers painless. Presenters can take turns without anyone getting up to swap cables.
BYOM makes sense if your organization uses more than one platform, regularly welcomes visitors, or is fitting out drop-in rooms that people rarely book ahead. There’s very little to manage on the room side, since the meeting software lives on the user’s laptop.
A native room is usually the better call if you’ve standardized on a single platform, most meetings are scheduled, and people want one-touch join. You get a more consistent experience and can manage every room centrally. Microsoft walks through these options in its Teams Rooms planning guidance.
In reality, plenty of organizations use both. A Teams Room can keep a USB or wireless option on hand for when a client sends a Zoom invite. Our article on three ways to set up a Teams meeting room looks at how these setups fit together.
The biggest weakness is the reliance on personal laptops. A dying battery, an update that starts at the worst possible moment or a driver that won’t play nicely is all it takes to hold up a meeting.
Security is the second concern. Letting guest laptops onto the room network needs proper planning: a separate guest network, isolated devices and data wiped at the end of every session.
The experience is also less predictable. Users have to pick the right camera and mic in their meeting app, and not everyone gets it right first time. A quick walkthrough and a simple how-to card in the room go a long way.
Skimping on audio is the classic mistake. In a BYOM room, sound quality comes down to the room’s microphones, not the laptop’s. If the mics aren’t up to the job, remote participants suffer, whichever platform you’re on.
Another trap is using a different connection method in every room. A cable in one, a wireless dongle in the next, a different app down the hall: people end up confused. Sticking to one solution across the whole site makes adoption much easier.
And don’t forget your guests. If a visitor can’t get connected without calling IT, the room has lost the whole point of being BYOM.
Getting a BYOM room right means picking the right peripherals, sizing them for the space and making sure they connect to the network securely. Motilde helps organizations design their video conferencing rooms, working with partner brands including Barco, Kramer, Logitech, Poly and Yealink.
The line between BYOM and native rooms is fading fast. Newer devices switch modes automatically, depending on whether the meeting starts from the touch panel or a laptop. USB-C, which carries video, audio and power over one cable, keeps wired setups simple. And wireless has become reliable enough to be the go-to option in a growing number of projects.
BYOM stands for “Bring Your Own Meeting”. You start the call from your own laptop, on the platform of your choice (Teams, Zoom, Google Meet or any other), and use the meeting room’s camera, mics, speakers and display.
BYOD only covers content sharing: you put your device’s screen up on the room display. BYOM adds the video call itself, with your laptop running the meeting through the room’s audio and video equipment.
Yes. Because the meeting runs on your laptop, BYOM works with any video conferencing platform. That’s its big advantage over a native room tied to one platform.
You’ll need a camera, mics and speakers that your laptop can recognize over USB, a display, and a way to connect, either a USB-C cable or a wireless system like Barco ClickShare. For a small room, a video bar in USB mode covers pretty much everything.
BYOM is a straightforward answer to a world of mixed platforms and last-minute meetings. People get to use the tools they know, with professional-grade audio and video. Its weak spots (laptop dependency, security and consistency) are easy to manage with the right equipment and a single, standard way to connect.
As more devices switch between BYOM and native mode on their own, choosing one over the other will matter less and less. The room fits the meeting, not the other way around.