This guide is for POUND ICONs teaching live classes/trainings/Pro Skills over Zoom. When it’s working, your music, mic, and Ripstix are perfectly in sync, and your participants feel like they’re in the room with you. When it’s not, the experience falls apart fast.
The most common culprits are internet speed, outdated software, and Zoom’s default audio settings (which are designed for meetings, not movement). This guide walks you through how to check and fix each one before you go live.
Work through the sections in order before your first Zoom class, and revisit any section if you run into issues. Please note that these recommendations are dated April 2026. Zoom regulary makes changes to their system and user interface so we recommend checking with Zoom Resources directly for the most up-to-date information and settings.
HOW’S YOUR SPEED?
For teaching POUND classes over Zoom with music, here’s what to aim for:
- Download: 25 Mbps minimum, 50+ Mbps recommended
- Upload: 10 Mbps minimum, 20+ Mbps recommended (upload matters more than most people realize for hosting)
- Ping/Latency: Under 20ms, under 10ms recommended (Ping is the speed from your device to the server and back)
- Jitter: Under 30ms (Jitter is the stability from your device to the server and back)
Where to test: speed.cloudflare.com/ or speedtest.net — run it a few times at different points in the day, since bandwidth fluctuates.
- Run the speed test the way you would teach — if you test the wired speed and it is fine but you’re teaching on WiFi, the speed test result is basically meaningless. Note: a wired connection is always more stable than WiFi
- Test during the actual class time — a 6am speed test looks great; a 7pm test on a shared residential network might tell a different story.
BEST PRACTICE: Wired internet — WiFi is the #1 culprit for drift and dropouts mid-class
IS YOUR ZOOM UP-TO-DATE?
Before anything else, make sure you’re running the latest version of Zoom — outdated versions can introduce audio bugs and missing settings.
To update Zoom:
- Open the Zoom desktop app and sign in
- Click your profile picture in the top-right corner
- Select Check for Updates
- If an update is available, click Update and let it install
- Once updated, reopen Zoom and navigate through your Audio and Meeting settings to reacquaint yourself with the layout — Zoom occasionally reorganizes its interface with updates, and you want to know exactly where everything is before you go live
BEST PRACTICE: Check for updates the day before any training or class — don’t update right before you go live, in case a new version introduces unexpected changes.
MIC CHECK 1…2…1…2…
Use an external wearable mic, either a lapel or a headset. Once you step back from your computer so your body can be in your camera frame to capture full body movement, your computer/external camera’s mic will not be able to pick up your voice for verbal cues and instructions. You need a mic that you can wear to transmit your voice and Ripstix strikes into Zoom’s audio.
Make sure your mic is charged. If it runs on batteries, have an extra set of batteries nearby. And you may consider having a backup mic because you never know what might happen.
NOTE: Depending on your computer’s built in camera, you may consider using an external camera for improved video quality and clarity.
TEST YOUR SETTINGS
You can test this with a friend or you can set up a Zoom meeting, hit record, and test your music, with verbal cues on the mic while striking your Ripstix. If you’re solo, watch the recording. Ask yourself or the person you’re testing with, “Is everything synced? Are the music, my voice and the sound of the Ripstix well balanced?”
Zoom detects a repetitive beat as background noise and will try to suppress it unless you change the Audio Settings.
On your end (as host):
Go to Settings → Audio adjust these:
- Original Sound for Musicians → enable this. This is the big one. It bypasses most of Zoom’s audio processing entirely. Have Original Sound for Musicians ON when teaching Movement, but turn it OFF when lecturing, otherwise participants will hear an echo of themselves when they speak.
Additionally, you can try:
- Suppress background noise → set to Low or Off
- Suppress intermittent background noise → uncheck
- Echo cancellation → you want to disable this if possible
Once enabled, you’ll see an “Original sound for musicians: on” in the top of your meeting window — make sure it’s ON prior to leading any movement with music.
There are additional settings under Original Sound for Musicians. None of these need to be checked, but you are welcome to explore the settings and test them based on your internet and the feedback you receive from your Support or your self-recorded test.
How to share your music through Zoom (if not using an audio interface): Play your music from your computer (not a Bluetooth speaker), then in Zoom, click Share Screen → More/Advanced Tab → Computer Audio → Share. This routes your music directly through Zoom’s audio rather than picking it up through your microphone, which gives participants a much cleaner sound. NOTE: if you like the music loud, connect external speakers directly to your computer through an aux cord or other hard-wired connection. We do not recommend connecting to Bluetooth speakers as this can often cause a delay in what you are hearing which means you are musically behind what your participants are hearing.
BEST PRACTICE: Original sound for musicians — this bypasses most of Zoom’s small tweaks that you’d need to make to ensure mic, music, and Ripstix are all synchronized. HOWEVER, you will need to turn Original Sound for Musicians OFF when participants are speaking during training so they do not hear an echo of their own voices coming through your mic.
IT WAS FINE WHEN I TESTED BUT NOW IT’S NOT WORKING!
When additional people join, Zoom’s audio processing kicks in harder — specifically its noise suppression, echo cancellation, and automatic gain control (AGC). These are designed for meetings, not music. They detect the beat as “repetitive background noise” and try to suppress it.
Try this:
- Make sure everyone but the ICON Lead is muted – ICON Support will help with this
- Close everything that is not needed – Close anything else that is not needed before class – Chrome tabs, email, messages, etc.
- Are you on a shared network? – You may need to ask family members to turn WiFi off on their devices, reduce streaming, gaming, etc. while you are teaching so you can maximize your network’s bandwidth
Best practice: Play your music through your system audio (not a Bluetooth speaker pointed at your mic), and share computer sound via Zoom’s screen share audio option, or better yet, use a wired audio interface. And don’t use Bluetooth headphones to hear the music yourself – playing music through Bluetooth introduces its own latency and can desync from video
NOTE: If everything is good on your side and your ICON Support reports clear sound, but you still have a participant that is reporting issues on their end, it’s most likely that there is an issue with their connection, not yours. Support can offer some of the tips from this sheet to assist the attendee.
FINAL FLOURISHES
- Make sure your space is clean and bright
- Choose a solid or neutral wall as your background — even a tidy space can read as visually busy on camera
- Position your camera at eye level or slightly above, framed so your full body is visible
- Have POUND touches — a banner, a vase of Ripstix
- Especially when teaching a one-day training, make sure you have lighting to support any changes in your space (e.g. nighttime vs daytime)
- Wear clothes that contrast your mat and anything in the background so Pros can see you and your movements clearly
- Be mindful of room acoustics — hard floors and bare walls create reverb that affects your mic quality. A rug, curtains, or a smaller room can make a noticeable difference
QUICK PRE-CLASS CHECKLIST
- Mic: Charged and back up mic is ready to go ✓
- Original Sound: ON ✓
- Background noise suppression: Low/Off ✓
- Ethernet plugged in ✓
- Everything closed (apps, tabs, etc.) except what you need ✓
- Music playing through system audio via Zoom’s “Share computer sound” option or wired interface, not a speaker in the room ✓
- Test everything yourself and with your Support ✓
