Support for Private Channels

Private channels enable focused private collaboration among a subset of your team. You can find detailed information on the capabilities and management of the private channels feature here - https://docs.microsoft.com/MicrosoftTeams/private-channels. Note: Work to release for the government clouds is in progress.

There are four other types of channel functionality on our backlog that we will continue to track – feel free to upvote and/or comment on the items listed next to each:
- Channel only members: to enable collaboration with people outside the team in a specific channel, without granting them access to the team itself. The channel member could be someone in your organization, or external to your organization (guest). https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/31374577
- Shared channels within an organization: allow people in different teams to collaborate on a shared project or v-team in the context of their own teams. A channel can be shared across teams in the same organization https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/18615565
- Shared channels across organizations: allow people in an organization other than yours to collaborate on a shared project or v-team. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/32987917
- Public channels: to provide an outbound communication window for a team to engage with everyone in an organization. These channels are accessible to everyone in their tenant, without needing to join. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/34154851

25,134 votes

(thinking…)

Facebook

Google

Forgot password?

Create a password

Signed in as (Sign out)

We’ll send you updates on this idea

Angela Sze shared this idea · November 01, 2016 · Flag idea as inappropriate… · Admin →

completed ·

AdminAlex (Teams Engineering, Microsoft Teams) responded · November 06, 2019

Private channels enable focused private collaboration among a subset of your team. We are super excited to share that this feature is fully rolled out to the public ring. You can find detailed information on the capabilities and management of the private channels feature here – https://docs.microsoft.com/MicrosoftTeams/private-channels.
There are four other types of channel functionality on our backlog – feel free to upvote and/or comment on the UV items listed next to each:
- Channel only members: to enable collaboration with people outside the team in a specific channel, without granting them access to the team itself. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/31374577
- Shared channels within an organization: allow people in different teams to collaborate on a shared project or v-team in the context of their own teams. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/18615565
- Shared channels across organizations: allow people in an organization other than yours to collaborate on a shared project or v-team. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/32987917
- Public channels: to provide an outbound communication window for a team to engage with everyone in an organization. These channels are accessible to everyone in their tenant, without needing to join. https://microsoftteams.uservoice.com/forums/555103-public/suggestions/34154851

Thanks – and we hope you love your Private channels experience!

~ Alex & the Teams team

Show previous admin responses (19)

great news! ·

AdminAlex (Teams Engineering, Microsoft Teams) responded · November 04, 2019

As we announced today at Microsoft Ignite 2019, we are thrilled to announce that Private channels is coming to Microsoft Teams. Private channels enable focused private collaboration among a subset of your team.

Private channels will be rolling out over the coming week, so if you don’t see it yet, hang tight!

Thanks,
Alex & the Teams team

working on it ·

AdminAlex (Teams Engineering, Microsoft Teams) responded · July 03, 2019

We acknowledge the customer demand for Private Channels and have been hard at work on it. Private Channels is currently in preview with a select group of customers. We expect to release the feature to the public later this Fall, and will update here when we are starting to roll out to all customers. We appreciate all the feedback you have provided to us on this forum and thank you for your patience.

~Alex

working on it ·

AdminAlex (Teams Engineering, Microsoft Teams) responded · February 04, 2019

Hi Everyone – thank you for your patience. As was commented by someone below, Suphatra is no longer at Microsoft, but rest assured we are working on this feature.

~ Alex

needs your feedback ·

Suphatra responded · October 17, 2018

Hey Microsoft Teams users — I want you to weigh in on new features around channels and group chats. The engineering team and I have put together this survey to find out how you want to see channels improve. You can fill it out here: https://microsoft.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_esTxHdABLQxKLvn

And I’m still waiting on approval to get you a good update about Private Channels. I can say that we ARE working on it, fervently.

working on it ·

Suphatra responded · September 27, 2018

Hey guys, guess who’s back from maternity leave? Your favorite Teams PM, Suphatra! I’ve been back for a few weeks and catching up on where we’re at in Engineering.

Private channels is still actively in development, and I am hoping I’ll be given clearance to share with you some more details. What would be great is if you can post in this thread any specific questions you have about the feature, besides just an inquiry on the release date.

You can also email them to me at sparavi@microsoft.com, as well as any other concerns you might have.

It’s good to be back, and good to be posting on here again. I hope you are all doing well!

Sincerely,
Suphatra

working on it ·

Warren responded · August 06, 2018

This feature is still actively being worked upon. I’ll let you know as we get closer to release.
-Warren

working on it ·

Warren responded · June 01, 2018

This feature request is still in the works. No additional details to share at this time.
But the team is hard at work to ensure it is implemented in a fashion that will meet your expectations.

-Warren

working on it ·

Warren responded · March 20, 2018

This feature request is still in the works.

No big updates to share, but the feedback has been a huge help. So thank you all once again. As more details emerge from the feature team on the work being done, I will be sure to share it with you here.

We understand how important this ask is to you all and we are working to ensure it is implemented in a fashion that will meet your expectations.

-Warren

working on it ·

Warren responded · February 06, 2018

The survey is now closed. We had an amazing response, so thank you all very much!

Please know our surveys are used to help gauge multiple things. Don’t read into it as a roadmap of what is to come.

We will review all the feedback and are reading the comments you post as well. All your feedback is appreciated and goes through consideration.

As we progress on the feature request I will provide more updates.

Thank you!
-Warren

needs your feedback ·

Warren responded · February 05, 2018

We are still working on this item but would like some feedback from you!

This survey would provide us with valuable insight and help drive several requests. It should only take a couple minutes to quickly fill out.
https://microsoft.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cGv5UzDjoR5idfL

We’re still aiming for early this calendar year (2018) if development and testing go well.

Thank you!
-Warren

working on it ·

Warren responded · January 23, 2018

This is still actively being worked upon. We’re still aiming for early this calendar year (2018) if development and testing go well.

I hope to have more details to share soon.

-Warren

working on it ·

Suphatra responded · November 29, 2017

Its been a while since my last update, so wanted to check in and let you know that this is well under way. We’re aiming for early next calendar year (2018) if development and testing go well. I’ll ping you again with a more exact ETA after the new year.

Meanwhile, feel free to ping me on Twitter at @skprufo if you have any questions!

Sincerely,
Suphatra

working on it ·

Suphatra responded · October 18, 2017

Hi everyone, quick update for you on this feature.

We’ve got lots of resources on this and we’re actively working on it. This is a top priority feature.

I haven’t gotten a firm ETA from the team but I can say this won’t hit in the next month or so. Its a complicated feature, so it will take longer than that. I’ll let you know once I get a general date from them.

Thanks for your feedback, patience, and as always, thank you for your support of Teams.

Sincerely,
Suphatra

Questions? Tweet me at @skprufo.

working on it ·

Suphatra responded · September 07, 2017

Hi everyone! Hope you’re having a great September.

I’m really excited to share with you the progress on this feature. To recap, we originally tried to resolve for this request by giving you Private Teams, but your feedback showed us that this was not the right solution. So we’ve gone back to the drawing board and we are in active development of private channels.

This is how we view a private channel: it will be a new channel type that allows users to create a channel with a different user roster than the parent team, that is only visible to those members. As the name implies, it is meant for sensitive discussions or for working with sub-teams.

As it turns out, private channels is a very complicated feature to deploy, because there are several dependencies external to Teams. I will keep you updated as we progress, and if you have any questions, please always feel welcome to email me directly at sparavi @ Microsoft (dot) com.

Thanks for your support of teams, and this great idea!

Sincerely,
Suphatra

under review ·

Suphatra responded · June 15, 2017

Hiya again folks.

I just wanted to write and let you know that I updated the idea to better reflect the vibrant discussion in the community about exactly what a private channel means. It looks like there are five definitions — shout out to user John Black who wrote it out so elegantly. I’ve included that description in the original idea.

We still have this item under review, and I’m personally interested in seeing if this request is further changed when we release guest access (coming super soon!) this summer. Stay tuned, stay cool, and as always, thanks for your support of Teams.

Sincerely,
Suphatra

under review ·

Suphatra responded · April 25, 2017

Hi everyone,

So a little bit of context for everyone who newly voted for this feature.

When you first asked for “Private Channels” we believed this could be solved by the new feature that we recently rolled out — the ability to create either Public or Private teams. Hence, the status on this item was “Working on it!”

However, the strong feedback from the community has been that this does not solve your original problem. So, we’re pulling this into review and evaluating ways we can implement this. It’s not an easy fix, so we’ll need some time. I’ll make sure to update you along the way.

Thanks and please continue to give us your great feedback. Your voice helps guide this product in the right direction!

Sincerely,
Suphatra

try this instead ·

Suphatra responded · March 23, 2017

We have enabled a new feature — Private and Public Teams. This allows you to make a team either public (anyone can join) or private (people can only be invited into the team).

This new feature should help many of you requesting private channels.

To make an existing team private or public, just click on the ellipses next to the team name and choose “Edit team”.

Thanks,
Suphatra

working on it ·

Suphatra responded · February 08, 2017

This is on its way.
Stay tuned for more updates as this moves along!
And if you need anything else, just ping me on Twitter or email.

Suphatra
Microsoft Teams

planned ·

Angela Sze responded · November 01, 2016

2091 comments

Comments are closed

An error occurred while saving the comment

Stephen Steiner commented · May 09, 2017 09:35 · Flag as inappropriate

I'd love to be able to @channel or @team in addition to specific people for meeting invites.

Submitting...
JJ Gunn commented · May 05, 2017 11:14 · Flag as inappropriate

This shouldn't be a huge deal. When someone creates a channel under the team, simply ask to add entire team or select members only. Just like Slack. Resolved!

Submitting...
Ivanmor commented · May 05, 2017 07:36 · Flag as inappropriate

Cant wait for this - in a web world - we have external people / employees or contractors and we need them to be seperate! Thanks!

Submitting...
Antony commented · May 04, 2017 08:02 · Flag as inappropriate

Me and a colleague were just chatting about the need for this very thing. Great to see that so many people have requested and that its currently under review.

Submitting...
Stavros Calimoso commented · May 04, 2017 04:25 · Flag as inappropriate

We need this!

Submitting...
Anonymous commented · May 03, 2017 11:43 · Flag as inappropriate

Here at coca cola, this would add a lot of value to our day to day.

Submitting...
Charles Breland commented · May 03, 2017 11:41 · Flag as inappropriate

Here at Coca-Cola we think that would be a very valuable feature.

Submitting...
Stephen commented · May 03, 2017 09:46 · Flag as inappropriate

Allow individual channels to be made invite-only underneath a public team.

Submitting...
Debbie commented · May 02, 2017 07:48 · Flag as inappropriate

We really would like this ability also.

Submitting...
Cris Crane commented · May 02, 2017 07:42 · Flag as inappropriate

I check this everyday for updates, as this feature is the last one needed before we could deploy it for our company.

Submitting...
Ajit Singh commented · April 28, 2017 03:07 · Flag as inappropriate

"Private" Channels is essential for using Teams in mid to large enterprises. Looking forward to using it once implemented.
a desperately needed idea.

Submitting...
Oralando Samuels commented · April 27, 2017 08:55 · Flag as inappropriate

This would be a welcome feature on my end as well. As we have 200 people in the office Teams that was deployed but there are some channels we would like to make private instead of rolling out a new team for just the people interested in that channel.

Submitting...
Mattie Brothers commented · April 27, 2017 08:13 · Flag as inappropriate

Thank you for listening! This will be a game changing feature.

Submitting...
Chaz Weber commented · April 27, 2017 07:51 · Flag as inappropriate

Thanks for the update!

Submitting...
Anonymous commented · April 26, 2017 14:44 · Flag as inappropriate

Cannot wait, this is crucial

Submitting...
Sheldon Kelly commented · April 26, 2017 14:08 · Flag as inappropriate

Wonderful!!! Looking forward to the updates and eventual implementation and availability of Private Channels

Submitting...
Tim Goalen commented · April 26, 2017 12:46 · Flag as inappropriate

Great news to see this is changed to Under Review, Suphatra... this will be a great feature to have on Teams

Submitting...
Mitch commented · April 26, 2017 08:03 · Flag as inappropriate

Brett's statement about new namespaces is super, and all; however, there is a pretty big issue.

Our PMO used to rely on site mailboxes within PWA. In the meantime, Microsoft thought it would be swell to force everyone to use Groups. Guess what? Now, there is an Office Group created for _each_ project, which is totally separate from the project site within pwa. The guy has so many groups listed in Outlook, I'm surprised it hasn't just refused to load anymore.

The point being: if the PMO is being forced to move away from what was a fairly elegant solution to something as discombobulated and friction-inducing as having separate Groups/Teams for each project, he may have to evaluate a different project management solution.

Having private channels _might_ help alleviate some of that friction, having a single Project Management Group/Team with channels dedicated to each project. It still doesn't solve the problem created by Microsoft by 'easing use' of SharePoint and PWA. The fact that every few months, businesses have to reevaluate (read completely abandon) their processes, because Microsoft has decided in its agile wisdom to upend tools leads me to believe that either they are not listening or do not care.

You can't stay the 'standard office solution' behaving this way.

Submitting...
Bobby commented · April 26, 2017 07:26 · Flag as inappropriate

Thank for the update and for the hard work going into making this happen @suphatra!

Submitting...
Yan commented · April 26, 2017 06:23 · Flag as inappropriate

Add an access and authorization function into different channel. That mean, the administrator could set which group member could see the information from which channel.

It is really helpful, that even in one group there are also different channel and different topic need to be discussed with different members.

Thanks.

Submitting...