When you need to send an email, hop on a call, or record today’s lecture, you want to choose the right tool for the job. At Pitt, you have plenty of options to support your communication and collaboration tasks. The hard part is knowing which to reach for and when. Here’s your quick guide to pick the right tool for every conversation.
📥 Microsoft 365: Your Everyday Home Base
For most day-to-day work, Microsoft 365 is your go-to. It’s your Pitt email through Outlook, your documents in Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, your chat and quick meetings in Teams, and your cloud storage in OneDrive — all connected, all searchable, and all included with your Pitt credentials.
Because Microsoft 365 is Pitt’s primary platform, it’s the safest default whenever you’re not sure where to start. Access it online at microsoft365.com/apps or download the desktop apps for offline use.
🌐 Google Workspace: Your Complementary Toolkit
Here’s something you might not know: Pitt also gives every student, faculty, and staff member free access to Google Workspace, including Drive, Docs, Calendar, Meet, and Classroom. It’s not a replacement for Microsoft 365 — it’s a second toolkit that lives alongside it, useful for real-time collaborative editing, working with partners at other institutions who live in Google, or just personal preference on how you like to write and organize.
One important exception: Your Pitt Google Workspace account does not include Gmail. Outlook remains Pitt’s official, exclusive email service. You’ll also want to know that the Google account you log into with your Pitt credentials stays separate from any personal Google account you may have.
🎥 Teams, Zoom, or Google: Meet in the Right Place
Pitt gives you a couple of go-to options for meetings, plus a backup for calls that run long.
- Microsoft Teams is your default for everyday meetings because it’s already where you’re working. Since it lives right alongside your email, chat, and files in Microsoft 365, it’s the natural choice for a quick call, a team meeting, or a one-on-one — no separate app to open.
- Zoom is Pitt’s dedicated platform for classes and instructional content. It’s integrated into Canvas, and any class recording made in Zoom automatically routes into Panopto for storage and sharing. So Zoom is the default the moment a class, lecture, or instructional event is involved.
Good to know: Student-hosted calls in both Teams and Zoom are capped at 40 minutes. If your group project meeting or study session needs more time, you have a couple of easy workarounds: Schedule back-to-back meetings so you can pick up right where you left off, or set up your call in Google Meet using your Pitt account instead, which doesn’t carry that same restriction.
📼 Panopto: Host and Find Class Recordings
If Zoom is where a class or lecture happens live, Panopto (Lecture Capture) is where it lives afterward. When an instructor records a class in Zoom, that recording is automatically routed into Panopto and organized into a class folder rather than sitting in Zoom’s cloud storage. From there, it’s searchable, shareable, and easy to embed right into Canvas.
Panopto isn’t just for capturing what already happened in Zoom, either. Instructors can use it to record and live-stream original lecture content, upload pre-recorded videos, and combine multiple video sources into a single presentation. Some instructors even grant students Creator access so they can record their own presentations or assignments. If you’re looking for a recorded lecture from earlier in the semester, Panopto — not Zoom — is usually where you’ll find it.
✅ At a Glance
Still not sure which tool to open? Here’s the overview:
- 📧 Email, documents, and everyday work → Microsoft 365
- 💬 A quick chat or meeting → Teams
- 🎓 A class or faculty-led event → Zoom
- ⏱️ A call that needs to run past 40 minutes → Google Meet, or back-to-back Teams/Zoom meetings
- 📼 Finding a past lecture or class recording → Panopto
The Right Tool Makes the Work Easier
Pitt offers these tools as part of the same toolkit, each one built for a different moment in your day. Once you know which one fits which task, you’ll spend a lot less time hunting for the right software and a lot more time getting things done.
— Pitt Digital
