Microsoft Roadmap, messagecenter and blogs updates from 04-03-2025

Coming soon to Microsoft SharePoint Online: SharePoint and Global Admins will be able to use a Microsoft PowerShell cmdlet to review tenant-level usage data for the SharePoint agents trial.

After this rollout, the PowerShell cmdlet Get-SPOCopilotPromoUsage will show usage data for the SharePoint agents trial at the tenant level (total trial queries used, trial queries left, and trial queries available in tenant). This report will show historical data starting from January 2025 when the SharePoint agents trial started.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Production): The PowerShell cmdlet Get-SPOCopilotPromoUsage will be available starting March 1, 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Starting March 1, 2025, current SharePoint admins will need to download the 16.0.25813.12000 version of SharePoint PowerShell to access Get-SPOCopilotPromoUsage.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before or after the rollout. Review your current configuration to determine the impact for your organization. You may want to notify your admins about this change and update any relevant documentation.

Learn more: Manage trial access to SharePoint agents with PowerShell – SharePoint in Microsoft 365 | Microsoft Learn

Updated February 27, 2025: We have updated the content. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon: A new license request feature and self-service purchase for Microsoft 365 Copilot will be widely available for all tenants. End user license request and self-service purchase will now be available for users with Microsoft 365 E1, Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft 365 E5, Microsoft Office 365 Plan E1, Microsoft Office 365 Plan E3, Enterprise Mobility + Security E3, Enterprise Mobility + Security E5, Microsoft 365 Apps for Business and standalone products. Both License request and self-service purchase will be shown within Microsoft 365 apps such as Copilot Chat, the unpaid version of work chat included in your Microsoft 365 subscription.

License Request allows users to request a Microsoft 365 Copilot license directly from their admin. This helps you efficiently assign unused licenses or purchase additional ones and assign based on user request. Global admins, license admins, and user admins will be able to manage these requests seamlessly in the Microsoft 365 admin center and can choose between standard or custom messaging, including directing to a third-party URL.

Self-Service Purchase allows users to purchase Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses directly with their own credit card and use within their tenant with their Microsoft admin’s visibility and control. Note: If your organization has previously disabled self-service purchase for Microsoft 365 Copilot, your existing settings will be honored.

This message is related to MC853238 (Updated) Microsoft 365 admin center: New self-service purchase and trial settings (published August 2024, updated September 2024). This message is also related to MC886385 Copilot for Microsoft 365 available for self-service purchase (November 2024) and MC899941 Microsoft 365 Copilot: Self-service purchase settings in Microsoft 365 admin center (E3, E5) (September 2024).

[When this will happen:]

General availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling out late March 2025 and expect to complete by late May 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

License Request:

After this rollout, global admins, license admins and user admins will be able to manage license requests in the Microsoft 365 admin center, where you can approve or deny the request.

Notifications in the Microsoft 365 admin center of pending license requests from users: 

Admins can manage user requests in the Microsoft 365 admin center on the Licenses page:

This change will be available by default to users. Admins can choose to set up their own custom license request process outside of Microsoft Admin Center (Use your own request process).

Self Service Purchase:

As an admin, you ultimately still maintain control over licenses in your tenant. You can view licenses purchased by users in the Microsoft 365 admin center, by going to Billing > Your Products page. You can also view by going to the Licensing page and viewing or filtering to Self-Service licenses. On the Products tab, select the Self-service filter. As with any new product, you will be able to view product usage in your tenant in the Usage page in MAC.

You are able to take over control of licenses purchased by the user at any time and manage them as you would any other license within your tenant. Please note the cancellation policy for Copilot for Microsoft 365 – the user has a seven-day window to receive a full refund. Action notifications will surface in the Microsoft 365 admin center, when a self-service purchase happens, allowing you to see the new license on the licensing page.

• License Request Help and support: Manage self-service license requests in the Microsoft 365 admin center | Microsoft Learn
• Self Service Purchase Help and support: Manage self-service purchases and trials (for admins) | Microsoft Learn
• Deploying Microsoft 365 Copilot and AI at Microsoft with our works councils – Inside Track Blog

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout. Review your current configuration to determine the impact for your organization. You may want to notify your admins and users about this change and update any relevant documentation.

Coming soon to Microsoft Teams: The Facilitator agent can take notes during your Teams meetings and chats. The Facilitator synthesizes key information from the conversations, so users can catch up quickly. In meetings, the Facilitator allows everyone to co-author real-time notes and collaborate seamlessly. In chat, the Facilitator creates and maintains an up-to-date summary of important information as the conversation happens, including key decisions, actions items, and open questions to resolve.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 478611.

We introduced the Targeted Release preview of this feature in MC937709 (Updated) Facilitator in Teams Meetings and Chats (published and updated November 2024).

This message applies to Teams for Windows desktop, Teams for Mac desktop, Teams for the web, and Teams for iOS/Android.

A Microsoft 365 Copilot license is required to use this feature.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling out early April 2025 and expect to complete by late April 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

After this rollout, the Facilitator app will be on by default unless all apps are blocked by your organization. As an admin, you control whether Facilitator will be available to your entire organization or to a certain group of users. Learn more: Set up Facilitator in Microsoft Teams for collaborative AI notes – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn

Facilitator and Microsoft 365 are built on Microsoft’s comprehensive approach to security, compliance, and privacy. As a part of the security promise, you can discover, protect, and govern AI interactions with Facilitator through Microsoft Purview. Microsoft Purview Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) for AI helps IT and security teams proactively discover and manage data risks. Use DSPM for AI in conjunction with other Microsoft Purview capabilities such as Audit, eDiscovery, and Data Lifecycle Management to ensure data security and compliance for your organization. Learn more about Microsoft Purview here: Microsoft Purview data security and compliance protections for Microsoft 365 Copilot and other generative AI apps | Microsoft Learn.

Improvements planned for the future: AI-generated notes in chats will move to an editable canvas. This canvas will be backed by a Microsoft SharePoint Embedded file and document management system. We will provide more details closer to the feature’s release. Learn more: SharePoint Embedded Overview | Microsoft Learn

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout. Review your current configuration to determine the impact for your organization. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation.

Learn more

• If you’re using Microsoft 365 Copilot in your organization (with your work or school account): Data, Privacy, and Security for Microsoft 365 Copilot | Microsoft Learn.
• Admin documentation: Set up Facilitator in Microsoft Teams for collaborative AI notes – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn (will be updated before rollout)
• User documentation (meetings): Automate notetaking in Microsoft Teams meetings – Microsoft Support (will be updated before rollout)
• User documentation (chats): Keep track of chats with AI notes in Microsoft Teams – Microsoft Support (will be updated before rollout)

Based on customer feedback that Global Admin permissions hindered use of Windows Autopatch’s advanced features, we are removing this requirement to enhance the update management experience. Now, any tenant with a valid license can seamlessly access Autopatch blades, deploy and manage updates, and access support without Global Admin consent.

[When will this happen:]

The changes will take place on March 31st.

[How will this affect your organization:]

We are making it easier to find and use key update management functions. Now, any tenant with a valid Autopatch license can seamlessly access Autopatch blades—no feature activation is required by global admins.

Here is what is changing:

• Expanded Autopatch group capabilities: Autopatch groups now support Microsoft 365 Apps and Edge updates, in addition to quality, feature, and driver updates. This enhancement provides customizable deployment settings and release schedules for all update types in the Autopatch groups. Additionally, IT administrators can now select one or more update types for deployment within Autopatch groups, allowing for greater flexibility in managing update content. Administrators will now also be able to leverage four new templates that determine the Windows update installation, reboot, and notification behavior, making it even easier to manage content. For more information, see Manage Autopatch groups.
• New Windows Autopatch Client Broker flow: Gain flexibility in managing Windows Autopatch client broker. The new user experience allows you to turn on the client broker on-demand at the tenant level to determine device update readiness and collect logs for issue triaging. For more information, see Post-device registration readiness checks.
• Enhanced support and ticketing experience: Autopatch support can be accessed without feature activation. We are also introducing a self-help-based support ticket creation experience to make it easier and faster for you to find the information you need to resolve the issue you are seeing —thereby reducing the time spent searching for answers and working on support tickets. If you need further help after March 31st, see Submit a support request.
• Remove the Update ring policy extended Pause: Today the Extended Pause feature allows IT administrators to temporarily stop update deployments beyond the standard pause duration. To align better with the Pause behavior available as part of update client policies and Intune, this capability will be deprecated. Autopatch-managed Update Ring policies will now follow the same behavior as Intune, ensuring a consistent experience across the Intune admin portal.
• We are removing the Admin Contacts blade and monthly Quality update release schedule emails to simplify management overhead.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

Plan for these changes in the Microsoft Intune admin center and inform your team. After March 31st, you will no longer receive emails for support cases from the microsoftexperts.com domain and instead will receive them from the microsoft.com domain. If you have any questions or concerns, or need assistance, file a service request by visiting the Microsoft Intune admin center.

Updated March 3, 2025: Thank you for your engagement with the new chat and channels experience in Teams.

The GA rollout begins late March 2025 in a phased rollout and is expected to be completed by end of April 2025.

We’re making the following product improvements from Public Preview and Targeted Release based on user feedback.

• Users who haven’t onboarded yet to the new experience will have a simplified onboarding flow in Teams with fewer steps. Users who prefer to keep chat and channels separate can easily do so during the onboarding process or later, without IT assistance.
• When the new experience is available for a user, a Get started screen is displayed. Users will have the option to defer the new experience up to three times over the course of approximately three days. About a week after the new experience is available for a user, they will be presented with a final Get started screen and transition to the new experience.
• For users new to the experience on iOS, iPad, and Android, message previews will be on by default. For users new to the experience on Windows, Mac, and Web, message previews will be off by default.
• A quick navigation bar for teams and channels is available in Teams for Windows, Mac, and Web, at the bottom of the combined Chat view. Clicking on the bar will scroll the view to the teams and channels section for quick navigation. The bar displays in bold when there are unread messages in channels, or with indicators like “@” for unread @mentions in channels.

Note: These updates will roll out to users in Public Preview and Targeted Release ahead of GA.

To help prepare organizations for the new features, product guides for admins and users are already available on the adoption web page https://adoption.microsoft.com/microsoft-teams/new-chat-and-channels-experience. Adoption content has been updated to reflect the above product improvements here. We’ve been listening to user feedback on the pace of work and the challenges of keeping up with conversations, managing messages scattered across different locations, and triaging quickly. To address this, we’ve streamlined the chats, teams, and channels experience to make it easier for users to stay on top of what matters most.

For more details and screenshots, refer to Microsoft Teams announces out a new chat and channels experience | Microsoft 365 Blog

This message applies to Teams on Windows desktops, Mac desktops, the web, and iOS and Android devices.

This message excludes Education tenants. We will send a future post with an update on the plan for Education tenants.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 415249.

[When this will happen:]

Public Preview / Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out mid-November 2024 and expect to complete by mid-November 2024.

General Availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling out late March 2025 (previously late January) and expect to complete by end of April 2025 (previously early April).

General Availability (GCC): We will begin rolling out mid-May 2025 (previously mid-June) and expect to complete by late May 2025 (previously late June).

General Availability (GCC High, DoD): We will begin rolling out mid-June 2025 (previously mid-April) and expect to complete by late June 2025 (previously late April).

[How this will affect your organization:]

The new experience brings chat, teams, and channels into one place, in Chat, so users can easily navigate between all conversations without switching between contexts. Users start in the combined Chat view but can opt to keep chat separate from teams and channels like before.

In the Chat view, users will see these sections (in order):

1. Favorites containing any previously pinned chats and channels
2. Chats sorted by most recent
3. Teams and channels, organized in same order as in the Teams view

Also, users can create custom sections to organize projects and topics that can include individual, group, and meeting chats, as well as channels.

Favorites, Chats, and Teams and channels in one list in Teams for Windows:

Favorites, Chats, and Teams and channels in one list in Teams for iOS (also available for Android):

New filters for Unread, Chat, Channels, Meetings and more help users focus on relevant conversation in their list. Filters persist until turned off.

The new @mention view gathers all personal @mentions into one interactive list. Users can quickly access messages with @mentions across chats, channels, and meetings.

Use /go to: Quickly navigate to your frequently used conversation across your chat and channels with a new keyboard shortcut Ctrl+G (Cmd+G on Mac).

Customizing the experience

Users can tailor their chat and channels experience in Teams Settings. Users can choose to keep chat, teams, and channels combined in Chat (default) or switch to separate Chat and Teams views. In the combined Chat view on Windows, Mac, and Web, message previews are off by default to simplify the list. Users can turn on message previews in Settings.

When using the separate Chat and Teams views, users can still use the new filters and the @mentions view to triage and organize topics with custom sections.

Starting the new experience

A self-service guided onboarding flow in Teams will help users discover the new experience and configure it to their preferences. Users who prefer to keep chat and channels separate can easily do so during the onboarding process or later, without IT assistance.

When the new experience is available in your tenant, this screen will display to users:

The Get started button will take users to the new combined chat, teams, and channels experience in Chat, and highlight the location of settings. Users will have the option to defer the new experience up to three times over the course of approximately three days, providing flexibility while also moving an organization to the new experience overall.

This feature is on by default. The new experience has no admin policy. Each user can make choices to optimize for how they work best.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout. Review your current configuration to determine the impact for your organization. For admins who opt in to emails for recommended Microsoft 365 training, an email for users will summarize the update when released.