6 new features in Microsoft Teams for Spring 2024

Introduction I'll be showing six new features in Microsoft teams this includes the return of custom images and announcements forwarding messages meeting improvements and a whole lot more so let's get started the first new feature is that Images for Custom Announcements custom images have returned for posts in the new Microsoft teams this disappeared for a little while during the switch over to the new teams and now it is rolled back out globally so I've got a post right here and I'm going to click this button and make it into an announcement now I could type an announcement but instead I'd like to upload a Custom Image and this has been especially popular with Educators I'll go right here and click this button just to note this is a designer icon I've got teams premium or if you have co-pilot you'll get the full Microsoft designer and AI powered image creation but I'm just going to show the basic one right here I'm going to click add image and then I'm going to select an image just like you could before and hit okay and that's what my image is going to look like so I'll select this and hit done and there is my custom Banner now for those of you that have designers which is coming with co-pilot or teams premium I can go into here and type something else a celebration and I can pull up some different options right here and hit done so that is a little more advanced option but the core of uploading custom images has returned to the new teams the second new feature is New UI for Posts a little bit of an update to the post UI in teams post so I will click Start a post right here and you'll see it's been vastly simplified along the bottom there's no longer like eight different options we keep it really simple you've got your nice emoji and Gifts options right here that have always been there you've got the loop component if you want to start one of those and then everything else is behind the plus so if you hit plus you'll have things like attaching a file set it to high priority all your different apps and you can search across the top right here so it's just a nice simplification so you're not overwhelmed with too many buttons and choices inside of your post the third Forward a message new feature is the ability to forward messages I'll go into the chat right here and I'm in my TPS report besties group chat now there's a nice TPS report picture here and I want to forward this message to someone else if I hover I'll get that three dot menu and I can choose forward this pops up a dialogue and it shows that message from the chat now I can enter a name an email or a group so I'm going to enter Alex Wilbur and I'm going to forward this message directly to Alex so let's hit Audio/Video drop down controls forward okay that is sent to Alex now you'll note I've got a little chat over here with Alex and it just turned bold so let's go into the chat with Alex and there we go there is the forwarded message and there's a little forward icon next to it and you can see that Mike thalson forwarded this message the fourth new feature is Improvement to audio and video controls in teams meeting so I'm going to join this meeting up at the top you're going to see these little icons camera and mic and they've been there before but now they're little drop down arrows to make it really easy to change settings so for microphone when I click the arrow see all these options options speaker microphone spatial audio noise suppression and more audio settings close this same with camera if I drop this arrow down you're going to see a preview hey there's me with a spaceship in the background I can switch my cameras my backgrounds are right here adjusting brightness and if I want to go to more video in settings I just go here and I can see all those same settings so it's really handy just very easy to click and see all the different options that you have right there the fifth new Annotations in Whiteboard, etc. feature is improvements to annotation in a teams meeting what I'll do is click the share button here and I'm going to share my entire screen immediately The annotation toolbar pops up automatically it's right there and I'm going to click on the little pen that says annotate now I'm in annotation mode it's going to share for everyone and there's the little whiteboard set of options now we've added laser pointer right here that's been a top request and I'm going here I'm using the laser pointer to trace around different things and that's temporary it'll go away someone's reacting with their heart I can also choose different pens maybe I'm going to choose a highlighter Right Here and Now what I'm going to do is go and highlight something on the screen so I'll go here and we'll do a little highlight oh look someone else Faith right there looks like she just drew something right around and faith has a little arrow pointing to her Circle the sixth new Right click on icon to set status feature is the ability to set your team status directly from the right click on the taskbar I'm in one note here I'm heads down on planning my TPS report strategy in the team offsite and I want to be able to change my status from available to do not disturb at the bottom you're going to see teams has a nice little green checkbox I'm GNA rightclick and I have all my different options here I'm going to set this to do not disturb because it is an important TPS report offsite strategy and you can see all the other options are here as well even reset status if you want to keep up with all the latest Microsoft updates and tips and tricks subscribe to my channel and then just ring the bell so you get all the latest videos that I post