Teleprompter for Zoom: Read Your Script Over the Call

4 Ways to Use a Teleprompter on Zoom

On a Mac the floating window is the cleanest of the four, because it solves the problem that breaks the browser setup: as soon as you click into Zoom to unmute or share a screen, an ordinary window drops behind the meeting. A floating window stays on top.

How to Set Up a Floating Teleprompter Over Zoom on Mac

Here's the setup I walk coaching clients through. It takes about four minutes the first time and seconds after that.

1. Get the script into the app. Download the Mac app (free, no account, macOS 15.6 or later), create a project and paste your talking points — or import the Word, PowerPoint or PDF file you already have. Write short, clean sentences: bullet points become natural pauses.
2. Set text size and speed in Prompter mode. Use large text (around 40pt) so your eyes don't sweep across wide lines, and a slow scroll. For a call you want conversation pace, roughly 100–130 words per minute, not presentation pace.
3. Open the floating window. Your script moves into a small window that stays above every other app, including Zoom in full screen and on other desktops.
4. Park it under the webcam. Drag the window to the top center of the screen, right below the camera, and resize it into a short, wide strip of two or three lines. The closer the text sits to the lens, the smaller the eye movement your audience sees.
5. Join the call and run it from the window. The floating window doesn't take focus, so you can click mute, share your screen or open the chat while the script keeps scrolling. Use its play/pause and previous/next buttons to hold on a point or jump to the next section, and its return button to go back to the full app.

Practice once before the call: run your opening 30 seconds with Zoom open so your eyes learn the geometry before you're live. If English isn't your first language, the app's language and the voice command language can both be changed in Settings. Before you join, run a quick webcam test and mic test so the picture and sound are ready, then check your look with your webcam before the call starts.

The same window helps when you record instead of call. Open it from Camera mode and it shows your camera preview with the script beside it, and you can start and stop the take from the floating window while another app — slides, a demo, a browser tab — stays in front. That is handy for async updates you'd otherwise send with Loom.

Why Eye Contact Matters More on Video Calls Than In-Person

In an in-person meeting, you can glance at notes naturally — the physical context (you're at a table, there are papers) makes it legible behavior. On a video call, a glance down breaks the screen plane entirely. The viewer sees your forehead. They stop reading your face, lose the thread of your words, and start wondering what you're reading.

The geometry of video call cameras compounds this. Most laptop cameras sit at the top of the screen. When you look at notes lower on the same screen, you're looking 15–25cm below the camera; on a 27-inch external monitor the gap is even wider. To the person watching, you've looked away. A script parked right under the lens closes that gap, which is the whole point of a teleprompter overlay for video calls.

Teleprompter for Zoom on iPhone, iPad or Windows

On iPhone and iPad, a second screen works best. Run the iPhone app or iPad app in Prompter mode and stand the device right below or beside the camera you're using for the call. The same trick covers Windows PCs and external webcams: the prompter device does the reading, the computer does the call.

If you use an iPhone as your Mac's Zoom camera through Continuity Camera, the iPhone is busy being the camera, so put the script on the Mac: open the floating window and drag it to the top edge of the screen, as close to where the iPhone is mounted as you can. Mount the iPhone at eye level on a tripod and pick it as the camera in Zoom's video settings. An iPhone over Continuity Camera also brings Apple's Center Stage with it, so if the frame starts sliding after you mid-call, turn off Center Stage on your Mac from the Video menu in the menu bar.

For a call on a borrowed computer, the free online teleprompter works in any browser. Keep Zoom in a window rather than full screen and place the browser window as a narrow column under the camera. The same browser prompter also fits inside OBS as a custom dock when you go live instead of joining a call: see using a teleprompter while streaming.

What to Put in Your Zoom Teleprompter Script

A Zoom teleprompter is most useful for structured moments in a call — not the whole call. Here's what works well:

• Your opening 60 seconds. The first minute of a pitch, presentation, or meeting sets tone and credibility. Scripting it means you don't waste those seconds finding your footing.
• Key statistics and figures. Numbers are where improvised delivery breaks down. "Revenue grew by... I think it was 12%... or maybe 15%..." is a credibility leak. Script your numbers precisely.
• Transitions between agenda items. "Before we move to the product demo, I want to revisit the Q3 context." Scripted transitions prevent rambling between sections. Split them into sections so the window's next button takes you straight to the next one.
• Your close. The last 30 seconds of a pitch or presentation should be as tight as the first. What's the ask? What's the next step? Script it.

For interviews, keep it to prompts rather than full answers — three or four keywords per question — so you sound like you're thinking, not reciting. The speech time calculator tells you how long a scripted opening will run before you're on the call.

Does It Look Natural? What Participants Actually See

This is the most common concern I hear from coaching clients, and it's worth addressing directly. In 200+ hours of coaching sessions where I've watched executives run through this setup, not a single participant has flagged teleprompter use as visible.

Why? Because what participants see is eye contact and confident delivery. The slight eye movement of reading large text near the camera reads as the normal movement of someone who's engaged and thinking. It's categorically different from looking away at a document.

The one setup mistake that does look unnatural: small text in a wide window, which forces rapid left-to-right scanning. Keep the text large, the window narrow, and the scroll slow enough that you read a phrase at a time.

Frequently Asked Questions