Panopto overview

Last updated: October 23, 2023

Panopto is the UW-IT supported lecture capture solution. Use it to easily record and review videos from courses, lectures, and presentations. Recordings in Panopto are viewable on most Web browsers and mobile devices.

Benefits of recording your lectures

Why record your lectures? UW students and instructors surveyed in 2019 provided some reasons:

  • Students can review your lecture and slow down the parts they may have missed the first time around. This is especially helpful for ESL students, students with disabilities, students with different learning styles, and students with challenging situations.
    • “I think Panopto is such a useful tool! When I had difficult classes it was so helpful to be able to rewatch [sic] a lecture to strengthen my understanding on a topic.”
    • “Panopto makes classes more accessible to students with attendance-impacting disabilities, to student parents, to EVERYONE! Making Panopto available means acknowledging that sometimes things happen in life outside of our control, and it shouldn’t impact our learning.“
  • Students can watch your recorded lecture before class meets and use class time to work together or have a discussion.
  • If a student does miss class, they can watch the recording rather than waste your time repeating the lecture during office hours. Instructors can cover more content and have deeper discussions in class. “Almost everyone still comes to class. If students miss class, it takes me less time to get them up to speed and they are less stressed about missing that class session. I have more robust questions in office hours because all of the basic questions are typically answered by them re-watching the lecture. The class is able to dive deeper into a topic when I post small videos before the class.”
  • In a UW survey, the majority of students indicated that Panopto has a positive impact on their learning
    • 96% of students agreed that Panopto contributed to their learning.
    • 94% felt more secure about learning.
    • 88% agreed that viewing recordings improved their grades.

Common concerns

Worried your students won’t attend class? Researchers in the UK found that attendance didn’t go down and in some cases attendance actually went up when instructors recorded their courses using Panopto. Some instructors give more quizzes in class or use Poll Everywhere in class to encourage attendance.

Having a bad hair day? Don’t use the camera on your laptop, or select a camera angle that doesn’t point to you in the classroom.

Want to limit who can see your recordings? The creator of the recording controls who can view it. By default, students in your course can view course recordings. Panopto videos at the UW are not available to the public.

Create a recording

Access Panopto using the Canvas sign-in. To use Panopto, creators and viewers must have access to Canvas.

UW offers several ways to record your courses:

  • Create a recording on your own computer (outside the classroom)
  • Schedule Panopto to record automatically during your scheduled class time (see instructions below)
  • Record using your own computer in a classroom


Schedule a recording
If you teach a course listed in the UW Time Schedule, in a classroom that supports the automated Scheduled Lecture Capture (the rooms with an Automated Panopto Recorder in the classroom list), you can schedule your recordings through Canvas.


Record using your computer
If you are teaching in a room with an AV Bridge that doesn’t have an Automated Panopto Recorder, you can connect your laptop via a USB cable and then use the cameras and microphones in the room and record from your laptop.

Learn more