Control who joins your Bridge meeting: Open, Trusted or Restricted

The three access settings

Each setting decides who joins straight away and who waits in the lobby. The host never waits and always joins directly.

Setting	Joins straight away	Waits in the lobby
Open	Anyone with the meeting link	No one
Trusted (the account default)	Invited participants who are signed in to a Bridge account	Everyone else, including invited people who aren't signed in
Restricted	Only the host	Everyone else, who must request to join

Who counts as invited under Trusted

Trusted depends on two things: the person is invited, and they are signed in to Bridge. Someone counts as invited when any of these is true:

They're on the calendar event, when your calendar is connected.
You invited them from inside the meeting.
You invited them from their profile.
They joined this meeting earlier and are rejoining.

Invited guests without an account still wait

A client on the calendar invite who has no Bridge account joins as a guest. Under Trusted, they enter a display name, preview their camera and select Request to join. You then admit them.

That is usually what you want with outside guests. Your teammates walk in, and you see each external person before they enter.

Which setting for which meeting

Start from who should be in the room and how widely the link travels. These are illustrative examples, not rules:

Example meeting	Setting	Why
A weekly team sync with colleagues who all use Bridge	Trusted	Invited teammates who are signed in skip the lobby, and a forwarded link still lands in the queue.
A sales call or client review with external guests on the invite	Trusted	Your team joins directly, and you admit each guest by name.
Open office hours where you post the link for anyone to drop in	Open	Nobody waits for you to admit them. Anyone holding the link gets in, so share it only where that's fine.
A job interview, a performance conversation or a deal negotiation	Restricted	You approve every person, even invited colleagues, before they hear anything.
A call where you're presenting and can't watch the queue	Open or Trusted	With Restricted, people wait until you stop to admit them.

Set a default, then change one meeting

Set your default in Account settings → Preferences. Changing it there updates your existing meeting links and any you create later.

To change a single meeting, open its session preferences. You can do this in the meeting's Brief before it starts, or in the meeting's settings once you're in. The change applies to that meeting only.

Later meetings on the same link go back to your account default.
To keep a reused link on one setting, change your default or set access each time.
Drop-in meetings started from someone's profile always use your account default.
Meet Now on a booking page has its own access choice: Open or Restricted.

Admit or deny people from the request queue

When someone requests to join, you hear a chime that only hosts hear. A request queue indicator appears in the top header, to the left of the participant avatars.

Open the queue to see each person waiting, then select Admit or Deny. While they wait, their screen reads "Waiting for the host to let you in…".

What happens	What the guest sees	Can they come back?
You admit them	The meeting opens	Yes. If they leave, they can select Rejoin while the meeting is active.
You deny them	"Meeting access denied."	Only if you send them a new link
You remove them during the call	The lobby, with a removal message	Only if you send them a new link

What admitted guests can use

Guests see the video grid plus the Participants, Chat, Conversation and Artifacts panels when you have them enabled. The Assistant and Notepad aren't available to guests.

Access decides who gets in. Participant controls decide what they can do once inside. You can turn chat and artifacts on or off for everyone, and decide whether others can share their screen or start recording.

Access requests in your notifications

Access requests also reach you outside the call. You always get an email, and it can't be turned off.

The in-app notification shows who is asking, with Approve and Deny buttons and a role choice. Member can view and manage the meeting. Guest can only view it.

Sources & further reading

Keep readingSet up a booking page so people can book time with you →