Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is team chat, video meetings and calling for organizations already running Microsoft 365, with a no-cost tier capped at 60-minute meetings.

Microsoft Teams is the team chat and online meetings app inside Microsoft 365, holding conversations, calls, files and apps in one workspace. Microsoft builds it and sells it both on its own and bundled into the Microsoft 365 subscriptions, so most buyers meet it as part of a wider Office estate. Work is organized into teams and channels: standard channels open to everyone, private channels for a chosen few, and shared channels that reach into other organizations. A department's chat history, meeting recordings and documents end up in one place rather than scattered across tools. Chat and channels carry threaded replies, file attachments and search across the whole history. Meetings cover scheduled and ad hoc calls with screen sharing, breakout rooms, noise suppression, recordings with transcripts, live captions, Together mode and immersive spaces. Teams Phone adds cloud calling over a PSTN connection, and Teams Rooms brings the same meeting experience to conference hardware. Teams Premium layers on extra meeting personalization and protection, while Microsoft 365 Copilot adds AI chat and agents. The Workflows app automates channel posts and reminders without code, and the Teams app catalog connects hundreds of business tools. Teams suits organizations already paying for Microsoft 365 that want chat and meetings without adding a second vendor. Small businesses of up to 300 employees can buy Teams Essentials on its own, or step up to a Microsoft 365 Business plan that bundles Office apps, business email and far more storage. Larger enterprises license it through Microsoft 365 agreements, where Multi-Geo data residency, eDiscovery and Microsoft Entra ID identity controls matter to IT and compliance. Each seat is licensed per user on a yearly subscription, with Teams Phone, Teams Rooms, Teams Premium and Copilot sold as separate add-on licenses. In a working tenant a project channel tracks a launch, a weekly stand-up runs as a recurring meeting, and a contractor joins as a guest without a full seat. It sits directly beside SharePoint and OneDrive, which store the files a channel shares, and beside Outlook, which carries the invitations. Partner companies connect through Teams Connect shared channels, so both sides post in one thread instead of trading email. Admins run the service from the Teams admin center, apply channel and meeting policies there, and audit message content through Microsoft Purview eDiscovery.