The pause control is one of the most-used features in the admin dashboard and one of the most under-explained. This article covers when to pause, how to pause, and what happens to uploads and the queue while paused.
What “pause” actually does
When you pause the wall:
- The display freezes on the current frame. Whatever’s on screen stays there.
- Uploads keep coming in. Guests have no idea you’ve paused.
- The moderation queue keeps working. Moderators can keep approving, rejecting, pinning.
- Approved photos queue up. They appear on the wall the moment you resume.
The pause is a display-side effect. The upload pipeline, the moderation queue, and everything else continue normally.
How to pause
Two ways:
- From the admin dashboard. Click Pause wall in the top-right of the event detail page. The button toggles to Resume wall.
- From your phone. Open the admin dashboard on your phone. The same button is in the same place. We recommend bookmarking the admin URL on your phone before the event.
There’s also a keyboard shortcut if you’re at the display device itself: P when the wall is in focus. This is intentionally not advertised on screen — guests would otherwise notice the bottom-left flashing every time someone uploaded.
When to pause
The big four:
1. During wedding toasts
People stop looking at the wall during the toasts. Worse: a photo from the bouquet toss popping up mid-vow-renewal is awkward. Pause when the speeches start; resume after the final clink.
2. During the first dance
Same logic. The audience attention is on the dance floor. Pause for 2–3 minutes and resume during the next song.
3. During the keynote
Corporate events benefit from a paused wall during the main speaker. The wall as a backdrop is great; the wall actively changing behind a presenter is distracting.
For multi-screen setups (keynote slide on one screen, photo wall on another), you don’t necessarily need to pause — but at minimum drop the refresh rate to Slow.
4. Before any “frozen moment” you want on the public gallery later
The wall snapshot at the end of the event becomes the cover image of the public gallery. If you want a curated frozen moment to be the cover, pause at exactly the right time, then end the event from the dashboard.
When NOT to pause
A few cases where it’s tempting but counterproductive:
- A bad photo just appeared. Don’t pause. Reject the photo from the moderation queue — the wall will refresh past it within seconds.
- You want to swap to a different display device. Pause is for visual continuity, not device swaps. To swap devices, just load the same wall URL on the new device — the old one will keep rendering harmlessly until you close its tab.
- The wall is overloaded. Pause doesn’t fix performance problems. If the wall is chugging, drop the cell count or switch to slideshow.
Pause as part of your event timeline
Build pause windows into your run-of-show document. Example for a wedding:
- 5:30pm — Cocktails. Wall live, ambient mode.
- 6:30pm — Dinner served. Wall live, slideshow mode.
- 7:30pm — Toasts begin. Pause wall.
- 7:55pm — Toasts end. Resume wall.
- 8:00pm — First dance. Pause wall.
- 8:10pm — Open dance floor. Resume wall, switch to mosaic.
- 10:00pm — Last call announcement. Wall stays live.
- 10:30pm — Wall ends. Public gallery URL goes live.
The whole pause-resume choreography takes about 15 seconds of attention per moment. Worth practicing once before the event.
A note on resume
When you resume, queued-but-not-yet-shown photos appear in the next refresh cycle. In mosaic mode, expect about 6 new cells to refresh over the first 10 seconds. In slideshow mode, the queue plays through one photo per interval until caught up.
If you’ve been paused for a long time (say 30+ minutes), the catch-up can feel rushed. To avoid that, after a long pause briefly drop the refresh rate to Slow for the first 5 minutes of the resume, then bring it back up.
What to do next
- Choose the right presentation mode so pause is rarer because the mode fits the moment.
- Photo moderation: approve, reject, pin for the queue side.
- Display the wall on a TV at your venue for the display setup.