Microsoft 365 Updates June 2021
Teams
Offline Access for Files
You will be able to access previously opened files even when there is no internet connectivity.
Chat Bubbles
Chats sent during a Teams meeting will surface on the screens of all meeting participants, making the chat more central to the conversation.
New Assignment Experience in Modal Window for Breakout Rooms
There will be an enhanced user experience for participant assignment. This includes new capabilities such as sorting participants and rooms as well as performing multiple selections and assignments to rooms.
Create Custom Together Mode Scenes
You will be able to build your own immersive scenes that elevate your meeting experience. You can build your scenes by going to the Developer Portal for Microsoft Teams.
Large Gallery Layout Update on Teams Mobile
Microsoft is introducing a mobile-optimised layout to provide a better experience for our Large Gallery for meetings on Teams mobile. As a result, you will be able to swipe through all the participants in a meeting.
Video Filters
Before joining a meeting, you can use the filters to subtly adjust lighting levels and soften the focus of the camera to customise your appearance.
Join a Meeting by Digital Code
Before joining a meeting, users must enter a digital code.
Lock a Meeting from Additional Joins
In the Teams meetings desktop app experience, organisers can choose to lock their meetings to prevent other join attempts. Therefore, anyone who attempts to join a locked meeting from any device will be informed that the meeting is locked.
Search Results Page
A new search experience in Teams will make finding messages, people, answers, and files faster and more intuitive. A redesigned, AI-powered relevance search will be based on the people and content you engage with most.
SharePoint and Microsoft Teams
Rich Previews for Pages and News Articles
When users paste links to SharePoint news posts and modern pages in Teams chat/channels, those links will convert into rich cards. They will display the page title, image, author and published date.
SharePoint
Email Notification Settings
With this feature, users can unsubscribe or re-subscribe to their favourite SharePoint email notifications.
Outlook
On the Web: React to an Email Message
Outlook on the web is expanding the existing ability to like email messages with a thumbs up icon. In addition to likes, users will be able to react with love, celebration, laughter, surprise, or sadness.
Word, PowerPoint, and Excel for Business
Quickly Bring up a Person’s Contact Card when Co-Authoring
When co-authoring in Word, PowerPoint, or Excel for the Web you can access people’s contact cards by clicking their profile picture in the ribbon.
To note: whilst these features are expected to be released in June, the process of rolling them out to all users can take time. Occasionally features can be delayed.