Upcoming Enhancements to Microsoft Teams Meeting Chat Controls

There are many kinds of meetings, and Teams is a great tool to have virtual meetings in. As an example, it is possible to get to the chat of the meeting and start the discussion up front or continue the discussions or ask follow up questions after the meeting is over.  But sometimes, there are scenarios where organizer would want to keep the chat closed for comments outside of the meeting timeframe. And here is a new feature coming our way, to control exactly that behavior. The Teams admin center will soon allow setting up policies that will enhance your control over meeting chats. These new options are designed to give administrators more flexibility in managing how and when participants can interact via chat during meetings. These options will be available across all platforms, including Teams for Windows and Mac desktops, Teams on the web, and Teams for iOS/Android. This update is part of the Microsoft 365 Roadmap   If you are an admin, here is where you can find and contro...

Custom Emojis and Reactions in Microsoft Teams

Here is another post on a topic that isn't exactly new, but some organizations might not realize that as early ass July 2024, Microsoft released a new feature in Microsoft Teams that allows users to add their own custom emojis and reactions. These custom gifs are then available to everyone in the tenant. Up to 5,000 custom emojis can be added per tenant, and was enabled by default.

If your organization prefer to manage this feature, admins can manage this feature through the Teams Admin Center with controls to turn the feature on or off, set user permissions for creating new emojis, and set user permissions for deleting emojis. 


For end user who wants to use the feature, custom emojis and reactions is available in the emoji and reaction menus under the Custom category. Users with upload permissions can add new content via the plus (+) button, while those with delete permissions can right-click any custom emoji to remove it. Note that it may take up to 24 hours for deleted emojis to be removed for all users.