What’s New in Microsoft Teams – June 2020

Microsoft Teams is an all-in-one collaboration and communication tool, continuing to play a pivotal role in remote working environments.

Microsoft Teams is the fastest growing app in Microsoft history, but has seen even more significant growth due to the need for remote working during the coronavirus pandemic. Most recently, Microsoft’s Corporate Vice President, Jeff Teper, told Venture Beat that ‘Teams will be even bigger than Windows’. Teams saw a rise in daily users from 44 million in March 2020 to 75 million in April 2020, and it’s also no secret that Microsoft have heavily invested in the app and are continuing to invest in its integration with other Office 365 and third-party apps. With this in mind, let’s look at the new Teams features available in June 2020.

Chat to 250 Participants

Previously groups chats were available for up to 100 participants, however Teams now allows you to talk to up to 250 participants in a group chat. According to the Microsoft 365 Roadmap, this number is due to increase even further to 300 participants, allowing for wider-scale collaboration and communication.

Custom Backgrounds

In April 2020, Microsoft went beyond the feature of blurring backgrounds with the introduction of Teams backgrounds. This month, Microsoft have allowed for custom backgrounds to be available in Teams, meaning that any picture can be added to your background in a video call.

Dial in to Meetings

Furthering the belief that collaboration can take place anywhere, in April 2020 participants no longer needed to be online to join a business call, due to Teams’ new dial in features. For participants joining a Teams meeting by dialling in via phone, Teams now hides your phone number from any participants that are outside your organisation but will still allow for your team members within your organisation to see your number, therefore increasing user security and privacy.

Pop out Chats

Teams now allows you to double-click a chat in your chat list. Alternatively, you can select to open a chat in a secondary window. This means you’re free to move about in Teams and multitask your workload while having multiple chat conversations open.

Credit: Microsoft Support, Pop out Chat Options

Access Pinned Chats

Teams is now allowing for your most recent conversations, from both chats and channels, to be available when working offline in the app. Therefore, if connectivity is an issue, you can remain productive by referring to your recent engagements.

7 x 7 Video Chat Feature – Coming Soon

In May 2020, we were introduced to the 3×3 grid view for video conferencing, allowing you to view up to 9 video feeds within a call. We are due to see a further upgrade of this feature, with 49 participants to be shown on screen with a 7×7 grid view. This feature is already being rolled out to education users, but it’s only a matter of time before it’s available to Microsoft’s business users.