Zoom: Grey Boxes Obstructing Window While Screen-Sharing

A guide to dealing with grey boxes obstructing the window while screen-sharing on Zoom.

Other participants may report seeing grey boxes obscuring the screen while you are screen sharing. These grey boxes are the windows for your Zoom controls and chat. This can be fixed by changing your screen sharing settings. Follow these steps to fix the problem:

  1. Click the green New Share button in the control panel.

    Screenshot of Zoom call menu, with "new share" button highlighted.

  2. In the pop-up window, deselect Optimize for sharing video.

    Screenshot of the screen-sharing window, with the option "optimize for video clip" deselected. This button is in the lower left corner, next to the "share sound" button.

  3. Select the window you want to share, and click the blue Share button in the lower right hand corner.

Keywords:
"What does this mean?" "Why am I getting?" "How to get rid of" Zoom Meeting, grey box 
Doc ID:
129234
Owned by:
iSchool U. in School of Information Sciences
Created:
2023-06-21
Updated:
2024-07-10
Sites:
University of Illinois School of Information Sciences