How to read your notes while sharing your screen on Zoom or Teams

When you share your whole screen on Zoom, Teams or Google Meet, everything on that screen is shared, and that includes your notes. There are three simple fixes. Share one window instead of the whole screen. Put your notes on a second screen. Or use PowerPoint Presenter View, or a prompter that is hidden from screen shares.

That's the short answer to how to read notes while sharing screen. Below are the exact steps for each app, checked against the Zoom, Microsoft and Google help pages in November 2026. Menus change between versions, so if a button name doesn't match yours, look for the closest one.

Why can people see my notes when I share my screen?

Sharing your entire screen sends a live copy of that whole display to everyone on the call. If your notes are open anywhere on it, in a Word file, a sticky note or a browser tab, they go out too. People often find out halfway through a talk, when someone kindly mentions it in the chat.

Each fix works in a different way and has its own trade-off.

How to read notes while sharing your screen on Zoom

The safest habit on Zoom is to share one app window, not your desktop. Your notes can then sit in any other window and stay private. These steps follow Zoom's guide to sharing your screen or desktop in the Windows desktop app.

1. Open the app you want to show, such as PowerPoint, a browser or a spreadsheet.
2. In the meeting controls, click Share. Older versions call it Share Screen.
3. On the Screens tab, pick the window of that app, not "Screen" or "Desktop". Hold Ctrl to pick more than one window.
4. Turn on Share sound under the share options only if you'll play a video or audio.
5. Click Share. A green border shows what people can see.

Now open your notes in a separate window. Keep it beside the shared window, not on top of it.

Presenting PowerPoint on Zoom with one screen. Zoom's own PowerPoint guide suggests running the slide show in a window. In PowerPoint, go to Slide Show, then Set Up Slide Show, and under Show type choose Browsed by an individual (window). Start the slide show, then share only that PowerPoint window in Zoom. Your notes in another window stay off the call.

How to see your notes while sharing your screen in Teams

Teams gives you two good options. You can share a single window, or share your slides with PowerPoint Live, which shows your notes to you as you present.

Share one window in Teams. Microsoft's guide to sharing content in Teams meetings covers this.

1. In your meeting controls, select Share.
2. Under the Window heading, pick the app you want to show instead of your entire screen.
3. If you'll play sound, turn on Include sound before you start sharing.
4. Keep your notes in a different window. To stop, select Stop sharing in the toolbar at the top.

Present slides with PowerPoint Live. This is the best built-in way to see speaker notes in Teams. The steps come from Microsoft's page on PowerPoint Live in Teams meetings.

1. Select Share in your meeting controls.
2. In the PowerPoint Live section, pick your file. If it isn't listed, choose Browse OneDrive or Browse my computer.
3. Your slides appear in the meeting with your notes next to them.
4. On a small screen, presenter view may be hidden. Select More options, then Show presenter view, or click the sharing window and press Ctrl+Shift+X.

Microsoft describes the notes as part of your presenter view, while attendees see the slides. Run a 2 minute test with a colleague before your first real talk, so you know exactly what they see. PowerPoint Live needs a .pptx or .ppsx file, and it doesn't work in Teams live events.

How to share a tab or window in Google Meet

Google Meet makes it easy to share less than your whole screen. Google's help page on presenting during a video meeting lists these steps for a computer.

1. Join the meeting.
2. At the bottom, click Present now.
3. Choose A tab, A window or Your entire screen. Pick a tab or a window.
4. Click Share.

Sharing a single Chrome tab is a neat trick for notes. Put your slides or demo in one tab and your notes in another window. A shared tab also sends its own sound by default. For a window or your whole screen, you have to turn on Also share system audio in the same dialog.

How to use PowerPoint Presenter View without showing your notes

Presenter View shows you the current slide, the next slide and your speaker notes. Your audience sees only the slides on the other display. It works best with two screens.

With two screens:

1. Connect your second monitor. Newer versions of PowerPoint set up Presenter View for you.
2. In your meeting app, share the screen where the slide show will play, not the one with Presenter View.
3. On the Slide Show tab, start from the beginning. Your notes stay on the screen you didn't share.
4. If the wrong screen shows the slides, open Display Settings at the top of Presenter View and choose Swap Presenter View and Slide Show.

With one screen: you can still open Presenter View with Alt+F5. The catch is that it fills your only display, so there's no clean slide show for the call to share. On a single laptop screen, the windowed slide show from the Zoom section, or PowerPoint Live in Teams, works better.

Can you hide notes even when you share your whole screen?

Sometimes sharing one window isn't practical. You might jump between a browser, a spreadsheet and your slides during a demo. Or you're on a laptop with no second screen. That's where a prompter hidden from screen shares helps.

Lenslines is one option for Windows. It shows your notes or script in a small black notch at the top of your screen, right under the webcam. It uses Windows' built-in screen-capture exclusion, so it's hidden from screen shares and recordings in apps that use Windows' standard capture, which is nearly all of them. That includes Zoom, Teams and Google Meet, even when you share your entire screen.

Because the text sits next to the lens, you also keep eye contact while you read. That's a real advantage over a second monitor, where your eyes slide off to one side. Our guide on how to keep eye contact on video calls explains why that small shift matters.

Some honest notes before you rely on it:

• Test it once with your own meeting app. Share your screen in a meeting with yourself or a friend and check that the notch isn't there.
• It's Windows only (Windows 10 version 2004 or later, and Windows 11). It doesn't run on a Mac.
• It costs $9.99 as a one-time purchase on the Microsoft Store.
• You can turn the hiding off in settings when you want the prompter to appear in a recording.

There are setup pages for Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet if you want app-specific tips.

A quick check before you share your screen

Whichever fix you use, a 30 second check before the call saves a lot of blushing.

• Close what you don't need. Email, chat apps and other documents can pop up at the worst moment.
• Turn on Do not disturb. It is called Focus assist on Windows 10. Notification banners can appear on a shared screen.
• Share the smallest thing that works. A tab beats a window, and a window beats the whole screen.
• Do a test share. Start a meeting on your own, share, and look at the preview.
• Write notes you can glance at. Short lines and big text are easier to read than full paragraphs. If you're timing a talk, our chart of how many words fit in a 5 minute speech helps you write the right amount.