Zoopla takes tour and video URLs on the listing record itself, in a field labelled for both. The important distinction is that a video has to come from a player Zoopla supports, while a hosted virtual tour is simply a link. Those are different rules, and the field name covering both is what causes the confusion.

The steps

  1. Sign in to the Zoopla member area and open the listing.
  2. Find the Video / Virtual tour URLs field on the listing record.
  3. Paste the tour URL.
  4. Save.
  5. Allow up to an hour for the change to appear on the live listing.

That last point matters more than it sounds. Changes are not instant, so checking the public listing thirty seconds after saving and seeing nothing is expected behaviour, not a failure. Zoopla keeps the current process in its member support documentation, which is the authority if the interface has moved on.

Video / Virtual tour URLsIf it is a videoNeeds a supported playerVimeo, YouTube, Audio Agent,Vistabee, Vieweet, Property ToursHosted elsewhere, it may not renderIf it is a 360 tourAny public HTTPS linkIt is a web page, not a video file,so no player list appliesLive on the listing within the hourTest the link in a private window before saving it, and open it once on a phone.
One field, two rule sets. A video has to come from a player Zoopla supports; a hosted 360 tour is just a web page, so the supported-player list does not apply to it. Mixing the two up is why a link sometimes saves but never shows.

Video versus virtual tour

For a video to display, Zoopla has historically required it to be hosted with one of a short list of supported players, which has included Vimeo, YouTube, Audio Agent, Vistabee, Vieweet and Property Tours. A video file uploaded somewhere else, or hosted on the agency’s own site, may not render.

A hosted 360 tour is a different case. It is a web page, not a video file, so it does not need a video player at all. It needs to be a working public HTTPS URL that opens correctly on a phone.

The practical test: if the thing being linked plays like a film, the supported player list applies. If it is something a buyer navigates, it is a tour link.

Zoopla’s own guidance on tour quality

Zoopla publishes best practice notes for virtual tours, and most of it is aimed at walkthrough video shot on a phone. The advice is sound and worth following where it applies:

  • Use the rear camera, and wipe the lens first.
  • Turn on every interior light.
  • Turn off fans, televisions, and anything else that moves.
  • Open interior doors so transitions between rooms are smooth.
  • Plan the route so it flows the way a real viewing would, starting outside the front door to orientate the viewer.

Several of these carry over to still photography for a 360 tour, particularly the lighting. Rooms shot with the lights on and the curtains open produce noticeably better panoramas, because there is more real detail in the source images to work from.

What to check before pasting the link

  • Open it in a private browsing window. This catches the single most common problem, which is a link that only works because the person testing it is already signed in.
  • Open it on a phone. Portal traffic is mostly mobile.
  • Use the direct URL. Shorteners and tracking redirects sometimes fail on portals.
  • Confirm the tour is published. Tour platforms commonly distinguish a private preview from a published link.

One tour, every channel

A hosted tour is a single URL, so the same link works on Zoopla, on Rightmove, on the agency website, in a mailshot, and in a WhatsApp message to an applicant. Nothing needs regenerating per channel.

That is also why the link preview matters. A tour link pasted into WhatsApp should show the property, not a bare URL, because applicants decide whether to tap based on what the preview shows them. A Spatia tour link previews with the property’s own panorama and its address attached, which is worth checking on any platform before you start sending links to applicants: paste one into a message to yourself and see what appears.

The other thing worth checking before committing is hosting. Where a platform bills per tour per month, a listing from two years ago is either still on the invoice or is now a dead link on a portal page. Spatia includes hosting in the one-off cost of the tour, so the link keeps working and the cost does not accumulate. The full cost comparison is here.

For the underlying question of how to get a 360 tour at all without buying a camera, there is a separate piece on that. The short version: Spatia builds the tour from the photographs already taken for the listing, which removes the booking rather than making it cheaper, and produces exactly the kind of plain public link this field is expecting. Nothing to schedule means the tour can go into the field the same day the listing does, on every listing rather than the ones somebody remembered to arrange.