Allow external users to access group chat
Why isn't it possible to add external users to group chat? It's a big step backwards comparing to Skype for Business and it makes life more difficult for companies working with various clients on a daily basis.

48 comments
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Brock commented
please allow this @Microsoft #Microsoft
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Stefan Wylie commented
In the current environment, there’s no reason this should t be a feature! Make it so please.
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Anonymous commented
Agreed, it is a huge disadvantage compared to all the other chat apps available.
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Osman Sharif commented
Seamless integration with users being internal and external is needed - lets remove the complexity for collaboration with all users
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Anonymous commented
Would be a nice addition
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AlexW commented
If not in full an option to switch on/off per team/Channel would be great
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Stefan Benadik commented
Yes, this would be very helpful. Tx
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Casper commented
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/communicate-with-users-from-other-organizations
User can be added to a group chat...
External access users: No <-- Should be yes, but is currently no! :-(
Guest access users: Yes -
NOEL-BRIAND Xavier commented
Agreed !
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Alex commented
Group chat with external people is necessary, not every external person needs to be member of a team, and not every external conversation needs to belong to a team.
The group chat would work as a quick way to brainstorm with external people on a timeline basis, no threads, no excess of formalities and structure. It simply works going forward with people expressing their views in a quick and dynamic way.
I noticed the only work around this is by having your external users registered as a guest into your Azure AD, which then would imply they need to switch tenants to access this group chat as it will be hosted in your tenant, no theirs. Or you can do this vice versa, having someone else adding you as a guest user to their Azure AD, but then you need to switch tenants to access this group chat.
Confusing, and unecessary overhead. This goes in line with Teams making Guest users and External users that have the sameemail address be shown as different people. That is because Microsoft considers the external person using a different identity then the guest user, even though they email address is the same.
We need a better way to manage this, people get really confused when working with external/guest parties at the moment.
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Anonymous commented
Was hoping we could get off Slack, but this is a showstopper.
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tmfitz commented
Agreed! Come on Microsoft!
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Sven commented
I totally agree, we are used to this feature within Skype and users changed to Teams only are missing this as a key feature. Important to get this integrated in Teams again!
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Sergey Voronov commented
Agree, we often chat with several external users (our clients), but now it's only available via meetings, so we have to create fake meetings for that. As we exchange links, descriptions, and some answers take time, texting is more efficient for the case. We're migrating from Skype to Teams, and it's a real blocker. Slack and Wire already support that feature.
It's strange to allow group meeting with several external participants (creating a group chat), but forbid creating the chat manually https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/communicate-with-users-from-other-organizations
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Anonymous commented
I agree, this is something we rely on daily working within a global organisation. We need to be able to have group chats with internal and external email colleagues at regular intervals. If you could find a solution to this it would be much appreciated
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Anonymous commented
Skype consumer allows everyone to come and go as you will, so should Teams. We understand the need for the great policies. I love them, we also need control, but if I can talk to external users separately I could be able to talk with them to a co-employee
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Goutham Santhosh commented
Yes it's a big drawback
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Howard commented
I am a business licence holder and I desperately need this functionality. I must have wasted 3 days over the past month trying to get it to work only to realise that it never will with the current version of Teams.
Why oh why am I paying a premium licence fee for weak functionality; Zoom is striding out ahead. Stop dragging your heals, MS, and get this sorted. Teams has potential but is a waste of time for small businesses such as mine unless we can use it to properly collaborate with clients.
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Anonymous commented
We desperately need group chat with external users. We had it previously with Skype so it's more than a little disappointing that we don't have it now.
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Subendra Gaundan commented
If you setup a Meeting with the external users and then use the chat provided by the meeting it will enable you to chat with external users in a group chat...
Workaround until this gets implemented by Microsoft