How much does having your camera on contribute to your level of fatigue? Should you keep your video camera on or off? Little research, however, attempted to isolate and understand the impact of the video camera itself on Zoom fatigue. Others began studying aspects of virtual meetings that could contribute to virtual meeting fatigue (pro tip: muting your microphone when not speaking helps!). Researchers responded to this phenomenon by developing a Zoom exhaustion and fatigue scale. While such meetings offered a chance to maintain social connection in a time of social distance, a few weeks into remote work, “ Zoom fatigue” and “ virtual meeting fatigue” entered our vernacular, capturing the feeling of fatigue and exhaustion that comes from being stuck in an endless cycle of virtual meetings. When the global workforce moved en masse to working from home, many organizations leaned heavily into virtual platforms with video call capabilities (Zoom, Webex, Microsoft Teams) to replace face-to-face meetings.

Zoom conference video call