Executable file type protection for Teams chat and channels

Release notes for Microsoft Teams admin features

November 13, 2025

• Raise hands in town halls (Premium): Currently in a Teams town hall, attendees can't raise their hands and share their microphone and camera as they can in a meeting. With this new update, town halls organized by users with Teams Premium can allow attendees to raise their hand. Organizers and presenters can then bring attendees on screen to allow them to share their camera and microphone.

- Microsoft Teams: Executable file type protection for Teams chat and channels: Microsoft Teams now blocks messages that contain executable file types in chats and channels, increasing protection against malware and other file-based attacks.

- Polls support in a Teams town hall (Premium): This feature allows organizers to create and share polls directly within Teams town halls, gathering real-time feedback from participants through multiple-choice questions, and other types of polls.

- Teams admin center: Control external access by domain for specific users and groups: This feature allows you to gain granular control over external communication. By setting custom external access policies, you can define domain allow/deny lists and assign them to specific users or groups, the capabilities that were previously only tenant-wide (Teams and Skype for Business users in external organizations). Use this to pilot with a department, restrict high risk roles to approved partners, or open federation broadly where appropriate. For example, you can allow group A to communicate only with a specific domain, while group B can communicate with all external domains.

- Microsoft Teams: Front-of-room view control for town hall and webinar in Teams Rooms on Windows: When a Teams Rooms on Windows is invited as a meeting presenter, the front-of-room display defaults to the attendee view. Presenters always have full control from the console, including green room and off-stage management, and can switch the front-of-room display to presenter view without impacting attendees. Available in Teams Rooms Pro.

• Microsoft Teams: Private channels increased limits and transition to group compliance: We're updating private channels to use a shared mailbox for each private channel, instead of messages being stored in each user's mailbox. With this change, compliance policies set for the team's Microsoft 365 group will apply to private channels messages going forward. In addition, Teams will support more than 30 private channels, up to the 1000 total channel limit for a team. Private channel member limits will increase from 250 to 5000. You'll also be able to schedule meetings on private channels.
• Microsoft Teams: Recommended actions page in the Teams Rooms Pro Management portal: The new page in the Pro Management portal provides proactive recommendations based on your organization’s environment and upcoming events that can impact devices, such as support or certification expirations. Admins are prompted to update device and account data enabling rich insights from the portal, guidance based on space and device usage data (coming soon). This feature helps admins maintain smooth operations, and plan and budget efficiently. At least one Teams Rooms Pro or Teams Shared Devices license is required for access.

- Microsoft Teams: People count from Cloud IntelliFrame in the Pro Management portal reports: Admins get enhanced visibility into room usage from Pro Management portal reports with detailed occupancy data captured by Cloud IntelliFrame during meetings. This insight helps IT more effectively plan and optimize meeting spaces, and is available for rooms licensed with Teams Rooms Pro.

- Immersive events in Microsoft Teams: This feature lets you host interactive virtual events with avatars in customizable 3D spaces. You can also schedule immersive events from your Teams calendar and join events directly in Microsoft Teams on PC or Mac without any extra app downloads. Organizers can customize an immersive event's 3D space with images, videos, and 3D models and no coding skills are required. Attendees can mingle in the 3D space and engage in multiple group conversations with spatial audio, express themselves with fun avatar reactions, capture selfie photos of the event, and send them to the event's Teams chat. A Teams Premium license is required for the organizer who schedules the event. Each event supports up to 300 attendees and attendees don't require a Teams license.

• Collaborative notes for chats: A new collaborative space is now available directly from your Teams chat, enabling real-time collaboration, organization of key information, and streamlined communications. Chat notes is available in 1:1 and group chat and is accessible only to the chat members. Add images, format text, share Loop components, and mention chat members when you require their attention.