# Host a webinar: what Teams events changes for speakers in April

Author: Marin Niehues, Stage Starter · Published: 2026-04-01
Topic: Talks & Stage (https://www.stage-starter.de/en/blog/topic/talks-and-stage/)
Source: https://www.stage-starter.de/en/blog/host-a-webinar/

If you want to host a webinar, Microsoft Teams brings a joint Teams events experience for town halls and webinars from 1 April 2026, and for users with a Teams Enterprise licence the requirement for Teams Premium falls away from that day, as Microsoft states in a [Teams blog post of 3 February 2026](https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/blog/microsoftteamsblog/microsoft-teams-events-a-new-unified-experience-makes-it-easier-to-discover-crea/4488299) and on its [adoption page](https://adoption.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/meetings-webinars-and-town-halls/). The tool brings together the event page and registration as well as the recording and the follow-up in one place. For speakers, this means that a webinar becomes technically simpler as a further stage for expert talks, for example as a trial run for a conference talk or as an extension of an appearance.

**Key points at a glance**
- From 1 April 2026, Teams webinars and town halls are meant, according to Microsoft, to move into a joint events experience in the Meet app.
- From the same day, users with a Teams Enterprise licence no longer need Teams Premium for webinars and town halls, including the advanced features.
- According to Microsoft, Teams Live Events will be retired fully on 30 June 2026, and events already scheduled can run until 28 February 2027.
- With an Attendee Capacity Pack, digital and hybrid events can be scaled to up to 100,000 participants, while the adoption page names up to 1,000 attendees for meetings and gives no upper limit for webinars.

## Microsoft Teams events: what is new from 1 April 2026

In its Teams blog post of 3 February 2026, Microsoft describes Teams events as the next step in delivering professional events within Teams and gives the post the status Public Preview. The licence change has a fixed date. Town halls and webinars, including the advanced features, are available from 1 April 2026 to all users with a Teams Enterprise licence and no longer require Teams Premium. How things stand for other licences, the post leaves open.

Microsoft's adoption page adds that from 1 April 2026 the town hall and webinar experiences come together in a new, unified Teams events experience, which is meant to be reachable in the Meet app. When the new interface appears in your own account is for Microsoft to decide, so it is worth checking in the Teams app whether the Events area is already visible there. Teams Live Events is being phased out. The blog names two dates for it: on 30 June 2026 the format is retired fully, and events already scheduled can run as planned until 28 February 2027.

## What a webinar is and how it differs from a town hall and a meeting

A webinar is an online talk for which participants register in advance, listen live and can ask questions. In Teams, Microsoft separates three formats that differ in size and purpose.

**Three formats in Microsoft Teams according to the adoption page**
Criterion | Meeting | Webinar | Town hall
Purpose | Chat, video, documents and apps in one place | Track registration and attendance, custom fields, automatic recording | One-to-many format for large events with advanced production capabilities
Number of attendees | up to 1,000 | no upper limit named | no upper limit named
Special feature | Collaboration of the attendees | Data is stored in Lists and can be processed further | replaces Teams Live Events

Because registration data and attendance are recorded and the recording happens without extra effort, the webinar is the suitable format for an expert talk with registration. A town hall fits better when one person or a team broadcasts to a very large audience. For expert talks, that is rarely necessary.

## Host a webinar in Teams: the functions speakers use

The Teams blog names a number of functions that reduce the effort around a talk. When you save an event, Teams creates an event page automatically, which bundles settings as well as branding. Through the Discover tab, attendees find events and can register without relying on calendar invitations, and recordings of past events can be retrieved there later. In the Manage tab you administer the biographies of the presenters as well as sharing and registrations, and because the registration data can be retrieved there in one central place, you do not have to piece it together from calendar invitations.

For the follow-up, the blog lists follow-up emails and notifications about the recording, and custom domains for event emails are meant to improve the deliverability of invitations and reminders. A built-in Q&A and templates, with which an event can be set up quickly, are added to this. During the event, attendee cameras as well as hand raising and polls are available. Anyone who offers webinars regularly benefits especially from the template, because description, branding and settings can be maintained carefully once and the effort for every further date falls as a result. How to write a biography that convinces on an event page is shown in [What a speaker bio needs to do](/en/blog/what-a-speaker-bio-needs-to-do/).

## An example calculation: what a webinar with a recording brings

The sources' figures concern licences and functions and not the reach of an individual webinar, so here is an example with open assumptions. Suppose 100 people register for your webinar and 40 of them are there live. The follow-up email with the recording then also reaches the 60 registrants who were absent, and one talk becomes up to 100 contacts who know your topic. Because Teams collects the registration data in one place, you can see who registered and approach the contacts specifically after the webinar.

A webinar is also useful as training for the stage. A talk of 30 minutes plus questions corresponds to a common conference slot, and in the webinar you practise exactly this length with a real audience. Which slot lengths are usual is covered in [How long is a conference talk](/en/blog/how-long-is-a-conference-talk/), and how online formats relate to conferences on site is described in [Online or in-person conferences](/en/blog/online-or-in-person-conferences/).

## How to host a webinar in five steps

The following sequence is our recommendation for specialists planning a first webinar, and it uses the functions from the Teams blog.

1. You settle on a topic and a goal and state in one sentence what participants can do or decide after 30 minutes.
2. You create the event in Teams, save it as a template and enter your biography and the description on the event page.
3. You send the invitation through the registration link and remind people by email one day beforehand.
4. You give the talk in 30 minutes and leave 15 minutes for the built-in Q&A.
5. You send a follow-up email with the recording and name the next step in it, such as a conversation or your next appearance.

Our founder Marin Niehues has received more than 100 invitations on six continents, and Sessionize listed him as a Most Active Speaker in 2024 and 2025. A webinar complements such appearances with a format that costs no travel.

**From 1 April 2026, a Teams webinar no longer needs Teams Premium for users with an Enterprise licence, according to Microsoft, and anyone who wants to host a webinar gets registration, recording and follow-up in one tool.**

**How Stage Starter gets you onto conference stages**
Stage Starter is a speaker agency for experts from B2B fields. We research the conferences that fit your topic and your target clients, develop the talk with you and write several versions of the abstract for each call for papers. We then submit in your name, keep track of the deadlines and follow up with the organisers. In the [initial consultation](/en/erstgespraech/) we clarify which stages suit you.

**Microsoft merges webinars and town halls into Teams events from 1 April 2026 and removes the Premium hurdle for users with an Enterprise licence. If you want to host a webinar, you plan 30 minutes of talk, set the event up as a template and send the recording after the date.**

## Frequently asked questions

### How do I host a webinar?

You create an event in your webinar tool, invite participants through a registration link and speak live at the planned time. In Microsoft Teams, an event page is created automatically when you save the event, and after the date a follow-up email with the recording can be sent.

### What changes with Microsoft Teams events on 1 April 2026?

According to Microsoft, from that day town halls and webinars are available, including the advanced features, to all users with a Teams Enterprise licence without Teams Premium. According to Microsoft's adoption page, the two experiences are at the same time brought together in a unified Teams events experience in the Meet app.

### Do I need Teams Premium to host a webinar?

For users with a Teams Enterprise licence, Teams Premium falls away from 1 April 2026 according to the Teams blog. Webinars and town halls are then usable without Premium. How things stand for other licences, the Teams blog leaves open, and the licence overview of your provider gives the answer in that case.

### What happens to Teams Live Events?

According to the Teams blog, Microsoft retires Teams Live Events fully on 30 June 2026, while events already scheduled can still take place as planned until 28 February 2027, and the successor is Teams events.

### How many attendees fit into a Teams webinar?

Microsoft's adoption page names no upper limit for webinars and gives up to 1,000 attendees for meetings. According to the Teams blog, digital and hybrid events can be scaled with an Attendee Capacity Pack to up to 100,000 attendees.