Can people outside hear what we say inside?

No. When you are inside an isolated room, only the others inside hear you, and you only hear them. The open area outside is a separate audio group.

Is video isolated too?

Isolation is built around audio: inside an isolated room you share a private audio space with the people in there. Spatial audio rules still apply within the room.

How is this different from a Conference room?

A Conference room is a single video-grid call for everyone in it. An isolated room is a private area inside a walkable Open Spatial room that you enter and leave by moving your avatar.

Audio isolated rooms

Private spaces inside a room, where only the people inside can hear each other.

Last updated: 21. Juni 2026

What is an audio isolated room?

An audio isolated room is an enclosed area inside an Open Spatial room that has its own private audio. When you step inside, you only hear the people who are also inside, and people outside cannot hear you. It is like walking into a meeting room and closing the door.

How does audio isolation work?

Normally flat.social uses spatial audio: voices get louder as you walk closer and fade as you walk away. An isolated room changes that. Each isolated area has an invisible boundary, and your audio is grouped by which side of it you are on.

The rules are simple:

Step inside an isolated room and you hear only the others inside it.
People outside cannot hear anyone inside, and the inside group cannot hear the outside.
Walk back out and you rejoin the open room.

Distance still applies inside

Isolation decides who is in your audio group; spatial audio still works within it. Inside a large isolated room you can still drift out of earshot, so stand near the people you are talking to.

Screenshot · audio-isolated-rooms-01An Open Spatial room with an enclosed sub-room (four walls) containing two avatars talking, while other avatars stand in the open area outside it.

Inside the enclosed room, those two only hear each other.

When to use isolated rooms

Isolated rooms turn one Open Spatial room into many conversations that will not bleed into each other. They are great for:

Breakout rooms during a workshop or class
Meeting rooms and quiet 1:1 corners at a networking event
Booths at a virtual fair, so each booth has its own conversation
Focus pods in a virtual office

Because people move themselves in and out, nobody has to be assigned or moved by a host. They just walk in.

How do I add an isolated room?

Isolation is a property of certain room elements rather than a switch you flip per session. To use it, place a room element that is set up as audio isolated from the catalog in build mode. Anyone who steps inside its walls enters the private audio space.

If you need a custom isolated area, isolation is configured on the element itself (an enclosed element with a defined boundary and audio isolation turned on). Talk to us if you want a bespoke isolated layout for your space.

What to expect at the edge

Crossing the boundary switches your audio group right away, so the change is a clean cut rather than a slow fade. There is no on-screen line marking the boundary yet, so isolated areas usually have visible walls to make the edge obvious.