Throughout lockdown, Microsoft Teams and other video conferencing tools have really stepped into the spotlight for businesses big and small. Microsoft offers Teams as a key communication device in the Office 365 suite and is continually improving the offering to ensure the best experience is offered to its users and competitiveness is maintained.
We’ve rounded up some of the latest updates to Microsoft Teams that have been added since our previous Teams update.
Bigger group chats and Team capacity
Microsoft has now expanded the group chat capacity to a massive 250 participants. Teams themselves can support up to 10,000 people in an organisation, meaning there is room for everybody.
More backgrounds
Microsoft has added the capability to add exotic or plain backgrounds to your video calls. Whether this is for privacy or just a bit of fun, it adds another customisation layer to the camera interactions. We mentioned this in the previous update, but the feature has been further refined since.
Increased offline availability
Pinned chats and recent conversations are now available when you’re working offline, so you can access files and chats without connectivity which can be particularly useful when travelling or working away from home.
Added privacy for those dialling in on phone
For members of conference calls dialling in from mobile, numbers are now screened from individuals outside of your organisation.
Meeting options
There is now a ‘meeting options’ button to open a tab in your web browser where you can tweak your meeting settings, like lobby bypass and who can present.
Pop out a chat for multitasking
Double-click a chat in your chat list, or select 
Who’s there?
Meeting organizers can now take attendance during a meeting. To get an attendance report, select Show participants 
If you would like to talk through setting up or getting the most out of Microsoft Teams at your workplace, we’d be delighted to help. We are currently offering a free Microsoft E1 trial which includes Teams for 6 months – why not talk to us about taking advantage of this limited time offer?