No one wants a meeting to last longer than absolutely necessary and yet, when it comes to our professional lives, these meetings are an endless and kind of essential part of the hustle. But whether there is a lockdown or not, Google Meet is not going anywhere and it’s best to make the best of an unavoidable situation.
It’s important to know how long a Google Meet link lasts so that you can plan and set up meetings accordingly. So here’s everything you need to know about how long a Google Meet link lasts.
Are ‘Google Meet meeting’ and ‘Google Meet link’ different?
Yes, there are certain fundamental differences between the two even though they are part of the same ecosystem. It is important to realize the difference because the answer to how long a Google Meet link lasts depends on one’s interpretation of what the Google Meet link is.
A Google Meet is the actual meeting that a user joins and participates in whereas the Google Meet link is the address of the said meeting. An actual Google Meeting cannot exist without the link which is why whenever you create an event on your Google Calendar or click the ‘Start a new meeting’ button, a unique link is automatically generated.
Besides this, there is a massive difference in the life of a Google Meeting and a Google Meet link, the latter has a much longer shelf life and allows for a Google Meeting to be repeated/resumed depending on the meeting owner’s requirements. So while the two concepts enable the same function, they work differently to accommodate the user’s needs.
What is the length of a Google Meet?
Google offers different plans depending on your personal needs or the needs of the organization that you work for. So the kind of length you will get for any given Google Meet depends on the plan that you’re using. Free Google Account holders have access to Google Meets that last for 1 hour, so if your Google account is the basic one that requires no additional payment, a Google Meet will automatically end after the designated 60 minutes are over.
The moment you enter the paid category, i.e either Google Workspace Essentials or Google Workspace Enterprise, a Google Meet that you organize has a life of 24 hours before the meeting expires.
How long does a Google Meet link last?
Like we mentioned earlier, the Google Meet link has a much longer shelf life compared to the meeting itself. Whether the user is on a standard Google Account, an Enterprise one, or a Workspace Essentials one, a Google Meet link can be used for 90 days. This implies that whoever has access to the link can join/participate in a Google Meet using the link for 90 days or approximately 3 months.
There is, however, a special Google Account type that is exempt from the 90-day rule. In the case of a Google Workspace for Education Fundamentals which is used by Teachers and Educators, a meeting can be customized to expire immediately once the meeting is over. So no one can use the link to rejoin the meeting once the owner of the meeting has ended the meeting for all.
This feature was released for teachers and educators to avoid unsupervised classrooms on Google Meet, while Google has not confirmed exactly when this feature will arrive for the other types of G-Suite accounts, they have assured users that this feature is definitely going to be introduced in the future.
Stop Google Meet links from expiring [Explained]
Unfortunately, there is nothing that can be done to keep a link going after the 90-day mark has passed for a link. While a meeting can always be revived using its assigned link, there is nothing one can do to revive the link itself. So once a Google Meet link has expired, you have to create a new link.
The 90-day expiration period was probably given by Google under the assumption that no even can go on beyond three months or a quarter whether it’s team meetings or huddles. So regardless of which Google account type you’re using, this 90-day period is unavoidable.
Permanent Google Meet link [Explained]
Technically, there is no such thing as a permanent Google Meet link, however, you can create a recurring Google Meeting that will need to be renewed every 90 days. We have an in-depth article on how to create a recurring meeting on this link if you want to know how to create one. Recurring meetings are the closest one can get to a permanent Google Meet link setup.
That’s everything there is to know about a Google Meet link and how long it lasts. We hope this article was helpful. Take care and stay safe!
