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Welcome to What’s New in Teams for July! The Teams product team has been busy delivering several new features in July to help you be successful as you return to work after some rest and recreation during the summer months. And as you return, I also recommend you check out these nostalgic backgrounds for your next Teams meeting. Who doesn’t want to invite Clippy to your next meeting?
Now on to this month’s feature releases!
Power Platform & Custom Development
Security, Compliances, and Privacy
Meetings
Find a meeting recording based on what was said with Microsoft Search
You can now find meeting recordings in Microsoft Search based on the meeting transcript. This feature is available to all users by default and makes it easier to find videos in Microsoft 365. You can access this feature through the search bar in Teams you use to find other file types.
Lock a meeting from additional joins
Organizers can now choose to lock their meetings to prevent subsequent join attempts. Anyone attempting to join a locked meeting from any device is informed with a message that they are not able to join as the meeting is locked. This helps avoid distractions from late joiners during the meeting. You can find this feature under More actions in the Participant pane and is currently available in Desktop app only.
Slide translate in PowerPoint Live in Teams
Make your slides more inclusive with slide translate in PowerPoint Live in Teams. This private setting allows you to see a personalized view of the slide where text is translated in your chosen language. Now you can better understand the presented content privately. This feature supports 19 languages with more to come. Learn more.
Teams Meetings Auto Recording
Meeting organizers are now able to set a single meeting occurrence or series to auto-record by enabling the “Record automatically” setting from Meeting Options. The meeting automatically starts recording once the first participant from the same organization joins the meeting. Recording is saved to initiator’s OneDrive (privately scheduled meetings) or SharePoint (channel meetings). This feature is available in Desktop and Mobile and not available to an A1 user.
Paging on Video Gallery
When you are in gallery view mode, and there are more videos than what can be shown at once on the meeting stage, navigation controls < and > now appears below the Video Gallery. You can use these controls to view more video participants. The maximum number of videos on the meeting stage can vary depending on your device configuration and internet bandwidth. Paging is available in Large Gallery with Gallery (3×3) coming soon. Learn more.
Organization-wide background
You can now tailor your Teams meetings background to your organization. To enable this feature, simply upload images in the Microsoft Teams Admin Center under Meeting policies and they are available to all your users. You can add up to 50 images. Organization-wide backgrounds is now temporarily available and will require an Advanced Communications license when it becomes generally available by the end of the year. Learn more.
End user Real-time telemetry for meetings
Call health panel provides Teams end-users functionality that helps identify issues during a Teams meeting or a VOIP call. This empowers your users with diagnostics to investigate audio, video, content sharing or network related issues. The real-time metrics are updated every 15 seconds, providing the ability to trace issues as they occur. Access Call Health now under More actions. Learn more.
Related Content for Teams Meetings for mobile
Related Content makes meetings more effective by providing you with important information from your mailboxes, OneDrive for Business, and SharePoint sites. This helps you prepare before meetings by offering content you haven’t had a chance to read or may want to revisit. You can find this content on the Meeting Details page.
Hard audio mute includes PSTN attendees in meetings
Meeting presenters and organizers can now prevent PSTN participants from unmuting during the meeting and enable specific attendees to unmute when they raise their hand. The PSTN participant can request to speak by raising their hand in a meeting via dial-pad command (press *5). This can be helpful for press conference and classroom scenarios where you want to be in control of who is speaking. Learn more.
Support for Human Interface Devices on Windows Virtual Desktop
This feature enables Human Interface Devices (HID) for Teams on Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD). Now you can connect external devices like a headset or mouse to interact in Teams on the Windows Virtual Desktop platform. For example, if you have a mute or unmute button on your headset, the controls are now recognized when using it in a Teams meeting in WVD.
Calling
Transfer Calls between desktop and mobile
Teams makes it easy to place and receive calls from several different endpoints, including desktop and mobile devices, but sometimes you need to move locations or devices to finish your call. The new endpoint transfer capability allows you to seamlessly move your calls between different devices, such as from your laptop to mobile phone, without any interruption in call service or quality. Learn more.
Speed Dial for mobile
Calling users on mobile devices can now access their Speed Dial contacts that were available on Mac, Windows and Teams devices. You can also add or remove speed dial contacts. This feature gives mobile users one tap access to reach their most important contacts.
Ekinops’ Session Border Controller certification
Ekinops, a leading network access and virtualization specialist has completed the Session Border Controller (SBC) certification process, which ensures that their SBC supports Direct Routing for Microsoft Teams, joining the list of certified SBCs. This rigorous certification process includes intense 3rd party testing and validation in production and pre-production Direct Routing environments. Direct Routing allows customers to connect their own carriers and infrastructure with Phone System to enable Teams Calling. Learn more.
Devices
Microsoft Teams Rooms update on Windows
The latest app update for Microsoft Teams Rooms on Windows, version 4.9.12.0, is available in the Teams Admin Center. This update includes:
- Teams only mode – IT Admins can now configure their Teams Room devices to not require signing into Skype for Business by selecting Microsoft Teams only mode from device settings. As Skype for Business Online service sunsets, Teams only mode is the recommended configuration for Teams Rooms for most organizations. Device in Microsoft Teams only mode can join Skype for Business meetings as a guest. Microsoft Teams only mode is also set as the default mode for newly imaged Teams Rooms devices in device OOBE.
Microsoft Teams Rooms Managed Services updates
Microsoft Teams Rooms Managed Services has received several updates this month
- Detection of widespread outages affecting multiple rooms – Global Incident Detection monitors each room, detects real-time patterns on generated incidents, and aggregates based on likely root cause. This accelerates diagnostics and provides a single view for unique problems such as power outages, network issues, or even widespread problems in the customer environment.
- Support Firmware Updates to cover additional OEMs and device types – This new feature optimizes software, firmware, security, and configuration updates, to ensure they are deployed safely and advance the performance of Teams Rooms.
- Dynamic Signal Tickets – Dynamic tickets provide more information on why the signal engine is activated, which leads to more actionable and specific tickets for Microsoft Teams Rooms Managed Service.
Newly certified devices
- Dell UltraSharp Webcam
The Dell UltraSharp Webcam offers great image quality in any lighting. This camera uses AI auto framing to always keep you in focus and allows you to customize how much of your surroundings you show. The 3D/2D video automatically eliminates motion blur and grainy images so you can look great even in low light. Learn more.
- Poly EncorePro 515/525 USB headsets
EncorePro 515/525USB-M headsets from Poly enable call centers to migrate from legacy equipment onto Teams and cloud platforms. The headsets feature USB-A and USB-C options on the same cable. With easy to use buttons and increased durability, this digital headset helps enable hybrid working. Learn more.
- Poly Studio P15
Poly Studio P15 personal video bar is now certified for use with Microsoft Teams Rooms. For focus rooms with meeting participants up to three, this compact video bar automatically adjust camera framing to fit the group of people in the room, while Poly NoiseBlockAI and Acoustic Fence technologies help so that you are heard clearly without distracting sounds. Learn more.
- Yealink MVC640 intelligent Microsoft Teams Rooms system
The MVC640 is a great choice for customers who want to add Microsoft Teams Artificial Intelligence to their meeting rooms. It provides 4K camera, wireless sharing, and easy meeting control with its’s MTouch II touch panel or the Cortana speech assistant for a completely touchless way of operating the Microsoft Teams Room and meeting. Learn more.
- Crestron Flex Microsoft Teams Rooms Advanced Kits
Crestron Flex provides customizable Microsoft Teams Rooms solutions. Every space, regardless of size can be outfitted for optimal audio and video performance. So, whether staff are working on site or remotely, everyone is seen and heard equally well. Flex advanced kits include standard 3-year hardware warranty with FlexCare upgrade options. Learn more.
Chat & Collaboration
Expanded emoji picker
Bring your whole self to the conversation with more than 800 emojis. Have more fun and better express yourself with the large variety of emojis. Select a category and easily find the emoji you need and use the skin tone selector to pick an emoji that better represent you. Quickly add emojis directly when composing a chat, use the short code picker to add emojis using text.
Immersive reader support for Mobile
Immersive Reader, which uses proven customization techniques to support reading across ages and abilities, is coming to Teams iOS and Android apps. You can now hear posts and chat messages read aloud using Immersive Reader on the Teams mobile apps. This functionality was previously available only on the web and desktop apps.
Inline Message Translation in channels for Android and iOS
Inline message translation in Channels lets you translate Channel posts and replies into your preferred language. To translate a message, press-and-hold the channel post or reply and then select “Translate”. The post/reply will be translated to your UI language by default. If you want to change the translation language, go to Settings > General > Translation.
Headspace integration with Microsoft Viva Insights
A curated set of guided meditations and mindfulness exercises from Headspace are now available in the Viva Insights app in Teams to help you start your day grounded, relax your mind before a big presentation, or disconnect from work in the evening.
Power Platform & Custom Development
Share-to-stage support for meeting apps
Developers can now configure their Teams meeting apps to use the “main stage” – enabling several collaboration scenarios. This integration allows the app content from the meeting side panel to take full screen and allow users to interact with it. Developers can learn how to configure their apps with our technical documentation.
Management
App risk evaluation
Teams admins are now able to view the security, compliance, and data privacy details for apps coming from Microsoft Cloud App Security. This helps Teams admins save time on security reviews and enable a more focused selection-based security specifications, resulting in increased app quality.
Left navigation updates in Teams Admin Center
To make it easier to find Teams’ features and navigate your Teams organization, we reorganized the left navigation for simplifying IT admin work.
Security, compliance, and privacy
Teams Multi-Geo Support
To help customers meet data residency requirements, Microsoft 365 Multi-Geo has been extended to include Microsoft Teams. This allows organizations to specify where their Teams core customer data sits, down to the team and end user. For more information, please see Multi-Geo Capabilities in Microsoft Teams.
Safe Links Protection for Microsoft Teams
The power of Safe Links is now available to protect users from malicious links sent via Microsoft Teams! To learn more, please see Safe Links in Microsoft Defender for Office 365.
Teams for Education
Engage students with class teams from Canvas
Educators can now create class teams based on the enrollment roster of their courses in Canvas. Each class team will have the appropriate user roles and students and educators can navigate to their respective class teams directly from their Canvas courses using desktop, mobile, or web platforms. Learn more about Teams integrations with Canvas and other Learning Management Systems.
Group Assignments
With the new group assignment feature, groups of students can work together to create, collaborate, and submit one assignment for the whole group. Educators can give individual comments and grades or group grades, and all students in the group will receive credit. This makes it easy to encourage student collaboration and for the educator to grade group work. Learn more about Assignments and grading class work.
New “Return for edit” Assignment option
Now, educators can return an assignment to students for edits. This way it’s easy to share feedback and allow students to learn from and incorporate that feedback into the original assignment. If you’re an educator just select the More options next to return and select “Return for edits”.
Filter assignments by class in main assignment view
Now educators and students can filter their Assignments by the class in the main assignment view. It’s a small tweak, but a great one if you like things organized and visible by class.
Education tailored deployment plan in Teams Advisor
For IT admins looking to set up Microsoft Teams in their tenants for the first time, now there is an education tailored plan in Teams Advisor. The Teams Advisor helps IT plan their overall deployment, and helps bring the project team together to create a cohesive strategy to deploy Teams in their education institution. Get started with the Teams Advisor.
Education policy wizard now automatically incorporates new features and policies
IT admins can now easily apply education tailored policies for a secure learning environment for students, educators and staff in few clicks. With the new improvements, whenever a new feature is added to Teams, the appropriate policy for that feature will be automatically added by default without any admin’s intervention. This helps make sure the right policies are in place to keep students secure and engaged. Learn more about the Education policy wizard.
Cortana now available for education customers
Cortana voice assistance is now available in the Microsoft Teams for Education mobile app. With this new capability, you can perform a variety of tasks with the click of the microphone button and a voice command. For example, you can:
- Check your class schedule by clicking on the microphone and saying “How many classes do I have today”
- Join a class by saying “Join my next Science class”
- Call or message a colleague or fellow student by saying “Call Megan” or “Message Megan”
- Find and share files, search or navigate.
Cortana voice assistance is available in English on both iOS and Android mobile devices.
Suggested Replies in chats now available for educators
Now, educators using the Teams mobile app can easily see up to three recommended responses to choose from while in chat, helping you save time and respond quickly. This is enabled by default for educators and faculty and disabled for all students.
Government
These features currently available to Microsoft’s commercial customers in multi-tenant cloud environments are now rolling out to our customers in US Government Community Cloud (GCC), US Government Community Cloud High (GCC-High), and/or United States Department of Defense (DoD).
Virtual Breakout Rooms
Breakout rooms allow meeting organizers to divide the meeting into smaller groups to facilitate discussions and brainstorming sessions. A breakout room can be created in a Teams meeting or channel meeting. Organizers can jump in between rooms, deliver announcements to all rooms at once, and bring everyone back to the main meeting at any time. All files from the breakout rooms can be found in the meeting chat. Available in GCC, GCC-High, and DoD. Learn more.
Guest Access
Teams now supports Guest Access between tenants inside the DoD Cloud. You can invite users in other DOD tenants to collaborate on documents in Teams channels, resources, chats, and applications while still maintaining control over your data. Enable Allow guest access under Guest access in Org-wide settings to turn on this feature for your users. This feature is subject to Azure AD and Microsoft 365 or Office 365 service limits. Available in DOD. Learn more.
Together Mode for Teams Rooms
Together Mode for Teams Rooms uses AI segmentation technology to digitally place participants in a shared background, making it feel like you’re sitting in the same room with everyone else in the meeting or class. Available in GCC-High.
Teams Meetings Auto Recording
Meeting organizers are now able to set a single meeting occurrence or series to auto-record by enabling the “Record automatically” setting from Meeting Options. The meeting automatically starts recording once the first participant from the same organization joins the meeting. Recording is saved to initiator’s OneDrive (privately scheduled meetings) or SharePoint (channel meetings). This feature is available in Desktop and Mobile. Available in GCC.
Live reactions in Teams Meetings
All attendees can now use emojis to react during a meeting. These reactions help promote inclusivity in meetings and keep things upbeat and interactive. Available in GCC and GCC-High. Learn more.
End user real-time telemetry for meetings
Call health panel provides Teams end-users functionality that helps identify issues during a Teams meeting or a VOIP call. This empowers your users with diagnostics to investigate audio, video, content sharing or network related issues. The real-time metrics are updated every 15 seconds, providing the ability to trace issues as they occur. Access Call Health now under More actions. Available in GCC, GCC-High, and DOD. Learn more.
Spotlighting multiple users in a meeting
Organizers and presenters can now spotlight up to 7 participants simultaneously during meetings. Once a single participant has been spotlighted, simply click on the context menu of your additional participant(s) and select Add Spotlight. For meetings that have multiple speakers or presenters, this is great to focus all attendees’ view on those specific video feeds. Available in GCC.
Organization-wide background
You can now tailor your Teams meetings background to your organization. To enable this feature, simply upload images in the Microsoft Teams Admin Center under Meeting policies and they are available to all your users. You can add up to 50 images. Organization-wide backgrounds is now temporarily available and will require an Advanced Communications license when it becomes generally available by the end of the year. Available in GCC. Learn more.
Live Events with Live Caption
You can now schedule and host a live event in the DOD environment – broadcasting video and meeting content to large online audiences. Make your event more engaging with moderated Q&A to interact with presenters. Live captions allow your audience to follow along with what is being said, providing clarity and inclusion. The Live events feature is on by default but an admin can enable and disable the feature for selected sets of users. Available in DOD. Learn more.
Large meeting support
Hold interactive meetings and webinars with more attendees—up to 1,000 people, including chats and polls. Available in GCC-High and DOD.
Windows 10 Native Notifications in Teams
You can now choose the style of your notifications: built-in Teams or Windows native notifications. The latter brings a suite of benefits, like respecting focus assist mode which enables you to avoid distracting notifications when you need to focus and integrating with Windows 10 action center to helps you review your notifications in one place. If you have a Windows build 10.0.17763.288 or higher, you can make this change in Teams notifications settings. Available in GCC. Learn more.
Chat preview notification settings
Have you ever shared your screen, or had someone looking over your shoulder at your screen and you found yourself wishing you could hide your notifications? Now, you can change your settings and control whether the message previews shows up on your screen. Available in GCC. Learn more.
Missed activity email
Stepping away from Teams? You can now continue and monitor your Teams’ notifications via email. A missed activity email is generated once every hour, in case you are away from Microsoft teams and have not reviewed your notifications. You can set your preferred email notification frequency in settings. Available in DoD. Learn More.
Device management capabilities
Device management capabilities in Teams admin center are now included in the GCC-High environment.
Tags
Tags in Microsoft Teams let users quickly and easily connect with a subset of people on a team. You can create and assign custom tags to categorize people based on attributes, such as role, project, skill, or location. Tags can also be automatically assigned to people based on their schedule and shift information in the Shifts app. After a tag is added to one or multiple team members, it can be used in @mentions by anyone on the team in a channel post or to start a conversation with only those people who are assigned that tag. Available in GCC-High. Learn more.
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