What’s New in Microsoft Teams - November 2024 (Ignite)
In today’s hybrid work environment, seamless communication and collaboration are more important than ever. Microsoft Teams plays a central role in keeping organizations connected, with its powerful calling and meeting room capabilities designed to enhance productivity and streamline workflows.
This blog will keep you up to date on the latest Teams Calling features, best practices for meeting room setups, and insights into how businesses can leverage these tools to improve efficiency. Whether you’re an IT admin optimizing your organization’s call flow, a frontline worker managing high call volumes, or a business leader looking for better collaboration solutions, this series will cover everything you need to stay ahead.
Stay tuned for monthly updates, deep dives into new functionalities, and practical tips to get the most out of Microsoft Teams!
Let’s dive into the key Ignite updates and how they can benefit your business!
Chat and Collaboration
Copilot file summary in chat: Public preview in early 2025
When a file is shared in a chat, you don’t always have the time to open it, read through, and grasp the key ideas. With new file summaries in 1:1 and group chats in Teams, Microsoft 365 Copilot can quickly summarize content from Microsoft Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and PDFs, so you can understand the main points without opening the file. This feature is also available on mobile, making it easier to grasp key ideas without reading an entire document on a small screen while on the move. It respects the file’s security policies, ensuring that only users with access to the file receive a summary, which will carry the same sensitivity label as the original file.
The new chat & channels experience: Available now in public preview
The new chat and channels experience is designed to help you collaborate more efficiently and effectively. It’s simple by default, enabling everyone to stay on top of what matters, and it’s powerful on demand, allowing you to organize information and communicate your way. Catch up on chat, channels and teams in one place, use filters to triage messages, create custom sections to organize conversations by topics, and more. Join hundreds of customers like Eaton, Vodafone, VML, Itaú Unibanco S/A and Kyndryl who are using the new chat and channels experience as part of the Teams private preview program.
Name pronunciation: Available now in public preview, generally available in early 2025
You can now record and share the correct pronunciation of your name, fostering inclusivity and ensuring colleagues pronounce names accurately. Simply open your profile card to make a recording. This recording will be accessible on your profile card to individuals at your workplace or school using Microsoft 365. With a single click, you can listen to your colleagues’ name pronunciations.
Skin tone setting for emojis and reactions: Generally available now
The new skin tone setting for emojis and reactions in Teams lets you personalize your digital interactions by selecting a skin tone that best represents you. In your settings, you can choose from a range of skin tones. Once selected, this will be consistently applied across chat, channels and meetings as well as on various clients, allowing you to express yourself more authentically in conversations.
Changing skin tone in Teams Settings > Appearance and accessibility in Teams for Desktop:
Meetings
New calendar experience in Microsoft Teams: Generally available now
The calendar in Teams has been redesigned for reliability and familiarity—you can now enjoy the same calendar experience across Teams and Outlook, with integration of both Copilot and Places to help infuse intelligence into your time management. Copilot capabilities like draft an agenda and managed booking, and Places capabilities like recommended in-office days, Places finder, and Places card are all available in the new Teams calendar experience. In addition to Copilot and Places features, the new Teams calendar brings new capabilities to Teams like calendar sharing, month view, multi-day view, print support, filtering, support for multiple time zones, and more. You’ll find the ‘New calendar’ toggle at the top right of the calendar app in Teams. It only takes one click to upgrade to the new Teams calendar, and you can easily pick up and resume exactly where you left off in classic Teams calendar.
Enhancements to iPad Teams calendar: Available now in public preview
We’ve updated the iPad Teams calendar to leverage the iPad’s form factor and make the scheduling process more seamless for iPad users. Users will now enjoy a default 5-day work week view, with options to switch to agenda, day, and 7-day week views. Enhanced features include a join button for easy access to upcoming meetings, synced category colors from the desktop, and the ability to reschedule events by simply dragging and dropping.
Teams Rooms and Devices
Speaker recognition: Generally available for Teams BYOD rooms in early 2025
Now you can get intelligent recaps and maximum value from Copilot in any Teams meeting no matter where you meet. Participants in any meeting space who have securely enrolled their voice via Teams Settings, can be recognized by their voice and attributed in meeting transcripts with cloud-based speaker recognition, whether it has a Teams Rooms system deployed or not. Speaker recognition in a bring your own device (BYOD) room requires a Teams Premium license or Copilot for the meeting host.
Dual display enhancements on Teams Rooms on Android: Generally available now
Now you can enjoy an enhanced meeting experience in Teams Rooms on Android with dual display rooms that show up to 18 videos (3x3 on each screen) when no content is shared. This creates a consistent experience across Windows and Android-based Teams Rooms. Additionally, admins can remotely switch screens in dual display mode using device settings and the Teams admin center, resolving front-of-room display issues without needing physical intervention.
Cloud IntelliFrame video feeds on Teams Rooms on Android and mobile devices: Generally available now
You can now experience Cloud IntelliFrame, the video framing capability that enhances the visibility of people in the room for online meeting attendees, on Teams Rooms on Android and Teams Mobile (iOS and Android) devices when joining a meeting that has participants in a Teams Rooms on Windows.
Teams Phone
Survivable Branch Appliance (SBA) can now support outages for up to 7 days: Generally available now
Survivable Branch Appliance enables users to continue placing and receiving PSTN calls in the event of a network outage. SBA relies on authentication tokens that are renewed daily. With this upcoming update, SBA will be able to use expired authentication tokens for up to 7 days. This will allow users to maintain connectivity for an extended period of time in the event of an outage. Availability timing for this update will vary depending on your Session Border Controller vendor.
Delayed simultaneous ring settings: Generally available in early 2025
For teams with shared call responsibilities, delayed simultaneous ring will ensure calls configure the intended recipient first, instead of notifying everyone the moment a call comes in. This helps reduce noise and minimizes distractions —especially for roles like delegates and customer service teams.
Queues app available on Teams phone devices: Generally available in early 2025
As part of our continued investments in the Queues app for Microsoft Teams, we are extending the Queues app to be available on phone devices. This experience will help agents manage customer interactions directly from their Teams phone device. Agents will be able to opt in or opt out of queues and access call history, which includes details like customer names, phone numbers, call times, and actions taken during the call. This ensures agents have all the information they need at their fingertips, making it easier to provide personalized and effective customer service.
Speed dial support on line keys: Generally available now
To enhance the calling experience for high call volume users, you can configure quick access to your most frequently dialed contacts using line keys. Whether you’re in a busy office environment or multitasking across a variety of activities, having speed dial options readily available on your phone’s line keys can help improve efficiency and productivity.