Hybrid costs roughly twice what a well-produced virtual event costs, because you are running two productions at once. That is only worth paying when the room genuinely adds something. Here is how to decide.
Run fully virtual when
- Your audience is spread nationally or internationally and travel is the main barrier.
- The content is the point, and networking is a nice-to-have.
- You want a library of sessions afterwards more than a day of atmosphere.
- The budget is under roughly £15,000 — a good virtual event beats a compromised hybrid one every time.
Run hybrid when
- A meaningful in-person group will be in one place anyway.
- Relationships, demos or hospitality need physical presence.
- Remote attendance is a genuine second audience, not a token gesture.
- You can fund a dedicated stream mix, an online moderator and rehearsal time.
The failure mode to avoid
The classic mistake is pointing a camera at an in-room event and calling it hybrid. The online audience gets room audio, unreadable slides and no route into the Q&A, and they leave within ten minutes. If you cannot fund a separate stream audio feed, screen content sized for a laptop, and someone whose only job is the online room, run the event in person and publish edited recordings afterwards instead.
Budget reality
A produced virtual conference typically runs £12,000 to £35,000. Hybrid at conference scale usually runs £15,000 to £40,000 on production alone, before venue and catering. Single-session formats are much cheaper on both sides — a produced webinar starts around £2,500.
What we would ask you
How many people can realistically travel? What must attendees be able to do — learn, meet, buy or decide? And what do you need on the shelf afterwards? Those three answers usually settle the format in five minutes.
More detail on each route: hybrid event production, virtual event production and webinar production. Or book a call and we will size both for you.