Microsoft Teams will soon let you add external people to group chats
Chatting with people outside of your organization is about to get easier on Microsoft Teams.
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What you need to know
Microsoft Teams will soon let you add external users to group chats. The feature should make it much easier to keep people up to date that you work with that aren’t part of your organization. The feature could roll out as soon as this month, according to theMicrosoft 365 roadmap, but that’s subject to change.
The ability to communicate with people outside of an organization is quite popular. Teams already lets you chat, call, and have meetings with external people. Its rival Slack also recently rolled out the ability tomessage people outside of an organization.
In order to use the feature, everyone involved will have to have external access capabilities enabled.
Here’s the feature’s description, as found on the Microsoft 365 roadmap:
With this feature users can create group chats that include people external to their organization using Teams (requires all users to have external access capabilities enabled).
Microsoft delayed the rollout of Shared Channels for Microsoft Teams earlier this year. While people and organizations wait for that to come out, the ability to add external people to group chats could help bridge the gap.
Microsoft Teams already lets you chat, call, and have meetings with people outside of your organization. Soon, you’ll also be able to add external users to group chats.
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Sean Endicott is a tech journalist at Windows Central, specializing in Windows, Microsoft software, AI, and PCs. He’s covered major launches, from Windows 10 and 11 to the rise of AI tools like ChatGPT. Sean’s journey began with the Lumia 740, leading to strong ties with app developers. Outside writing, he coaches American football, utilizing Microsoft services to manage his team. He studied broadcast journalism at Nottingham Trent University and is active on X @SeanEndicott_ and Threads @sean_endicott_.
