Embrace the Future: Transitioning to the New Microsoft Teams Client

Balu Ilag | October 31st 2023

01 Nov Embrace the Future: Transitioning to the New Microsoft Teams Client

Posted at 04:17h in Microsoft Teams by
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Embrace the Future: Transitioning to the New Microsoft Teams Client

An overview of the new Microsoft Teams client and how to prepare for the transition

Microsoft Teams has become an integral part of our daily workflows, facilitating seamless communication and collaboration within and beyond organizational boundaries. With the aim to enhance user experience and performance, Microsoft introduced a new Teams client, now available for Windows and Mac users including education customers since October 5, 2023. The new client also rolled out in a public preview for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) and government cloud customers (GCC, GCC-H, DoD).

A Leap Towards Enhanced Performance and User Experience

Earlier this year, the tech giant unveiled the new Teams app with a promise of delivering a faster, simpler, and smarter collaborative platform. The public preview showcased significant improvements in speed, with the new Teams being up to two times faster and consuming 50% less memory, thanks to its construction on the React framework and utilization of Edge WebView2 as the host. The enhanced core technology significantly reduced memory usage and disk space requirements, thereby boosting the app’s efficiency.

For Mac users, the new Teams client brings a notable increase in performance, ensuring faster transitions between chats and channels, and optimized experience even with multiple high-resolution monitors in use during calls or meetings. Security enhancements include a containerized app model, simplified app updates via Microsoft AutoUpdate, and web security enhancements such as Content Security Policy and Trusted Types.

Simplified User Interface, More Control

The redesigned user interface in the new Teams client aims at simplifying user interactions and allowing more personalized experiences. Users can now better manage their notifications with features like “mark all as read” in activity, and enjoy enhanced personalization options that adapt to their system settings, whether it’s light or dark mode.

Bridging Cross-Tenant Communication Gaps

Organizations, especially those with multiple tenants due to mergers, acquisitions, or global operations, can now benefit from the Multi-tenant organizations (MTO) capability in the new Teams. This feature facilitates seamless cross-tenant communication and collaboration, ensuring a rich collaboration and full-fidelity meeting experience without the silos.

AI-Powered Productivity Boost

The new Teams client sets the stage for next-gen AI experiences with Microsoft Copilot. Copilot in Teams assists users in staying on top of tasks, summarizing key discussion points during meetings, and pulling together relevant information from various sources into your Teams app, all in real-time.

Seamless Transition to New Teams Client

Transitioning to the new Teams client is designed to be straightforward with no migration required. Users can switch to the new client with just a click, initiating their journey towards a more efficient and collaborative experience. Microsoft has announced that post March 31, 2024, any classic Teams users who haven’t transitioned will be automatically updated to the new Teams client.

Preparing for the Update

Organizations can prepare for this transition by:

  • Ensuring system prerequisites are met such as updating to Windows 10 version 10.0.19041 or higher and having the Teams app version 1.6.00.4472.
  • Admins can utilize robust IT admin policies and deployment options like office update channels to enable new Teams for users and groups within their organizations as needed.

Notes for Special User Groups

  • The auto-update timeline of March 31, 2024, will not affect VDI environment users as the new Teams client isn’t generally available for VDI yet.
  • Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) and Surface Hub devices are also exempt from the March 31, 2024, auto-update timeline.

Education users can transition to the new Teams client at any time, and more details can be found on the provided reference page.

The new Microsoft Teams client embodies a significant stride towards creating a more efficient, reliable, and user-friendly collaborative environment. As the transition date approaches, organizations are encouraged to prepare and embrace the new era of collaboration that awaits with the new Teams client.

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