Microsoft Roadmap, messagecenter and blogs updates from 05-03-2025

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon for Microsoft Teams: Organizers for town halls, webinars, and meetings will be able to post and reply to questions using the title “Organizer” in the Q&A experience, instead of their names. This feature allows organizers to present a unified and official voice when responding to attendee questions.

This message applies to Teams on Windows desktop and Teams on Mac desktop.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 475856.

[When this will happen:]

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

After this rollout, organizers and co-organizers can choose Organizer or their own name when posting each new question or discussion or when replying to a question in Q&A.

Attendees will not see such an option.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This change will be available by default.

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

Learn more: Q&A in Microsoft Teams meetings – Microsoft Support (will be updated before rollout)

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the content. Thank you for your patience.

We are excited to announce that we will add the Microsoft 365 Copilot in Viva Glint feature to Feature Access Management in Viva. This will allow global admins and AI admins to control the rollout and availability of Copilot in Viva Glint.

Copilot in Viva Glint is enabled for all users in Viva Feature Access Management by default. If users have access at the Feature Access Management in Viva level, you will also need to grant access in the Viva Glint product as it is disabled for all users by default in Viva Glint.

Subscription plans for Viva suite or Viva Glint are required for using Microsoft Viva Glint.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 478655.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling late February 2025 and expect to complete by late March 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Microsoft 365 global admins and AI admins can use the Copilot page in the Microsoft 265 admin center Settings, the Feature Access Management page in Viva, the Viva Glint page in the Microsoft 365 admin center, or Microsoft PowerShell cmdlets to create granular policies and access policies for Copilot in Viva Glint:

• Tenant policy: Automatically includes all users in the tenant.
• Group/user-level policy: Admins can choose individual users/groups that should be part of the access policy.
• Admins can use both tenant and group policies for restricting or enabling access to both Copilot and Summarization.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

As a global admin:

• If you wish to leave Copilot in Viva Glint enabled for all users in your organization, no action is needed.
• If you choose to limit the availability of Copilot in Viva Glint to certain users/groups in your organization, create group/user policies through Feature Access Management in Viva to turn off Copilot in Viva Glint by tenant, group, or user.
• If you choose to disable Copilot in Viva Glint for your entire tenant, you can create a separate tenant policy in Feature Access Management in Viva to turn off the feature.

Learn more about Feature Access Management in Viva and Copilot in Viva Glint:

• Microsoft Viva – Feature access management | Microsoft Learn (will be updated before rollout)
• Microsoft Glint – Introduction to Microsoft 365 Copilot in Viva Glint | Microsoft Learn (will be updated before rollout)
• Microsoft Glint – Administrator enablement for Microsoft 365 Copilot in Viva Glint | Microsoft Learn (will be updated before rollout)

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.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

Presenters and attendees can now join Microsoft Teams town halls using dial-in options and join codes that are available in email invites. 

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 476489.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out mid-April 2025 (previously early March) and expect to complete by late April 2025 (previously mid-March).

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

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

With the release of this feature, Teams town hall attendee and presenter email invites will include dial-in details and join codes.

This update is available by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically with no admin action required. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation as appropriate.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

Microsoft Teams Events invite emails will be separated based on the role of the participant. Event organizers will get an email explaining the specific roles of participants in the event. Similarly, each presenter will get a separate calendar invite, allowing the organizers of town halls to maintain separate invites for attendees. 

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 476488.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out mid-April 2025 (previously early March) and expect to complete by late April 2025 (previously mid-March).

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

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

This feature update allows the organizers of town halls to maintain separate invites for attendees.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically with no admin action required. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation as appropriate.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

IT Administrators can now monitor the health of Microsoft Teams desktop clients for Windows and Mac through the new ‘Teams client health’ page in the Teams admin center.

• This page provides actionable insights into client health metrics, such as crashes, launch failures, and update failures. It also enables better monitoring of Teams client version adoption and updates.
• Administrators have detailed data on top issues, insights, and tools to quickly address client health problems.
• Administrators can monitor version adoption, version health, and get granular details about devices and users with the latest client versions.
• Administrators can see the recency of client versions and proactively address issues that prevent automatic updates to the most secure Teams client version.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 478610.

[When this will happen:]

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

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

When these capabilities and tools are released in Teams admin center, administrators will be able to access the ‘Teams client health’ page via the left navigation and be able to proactively monitor Teams client health and Issues impacting end users in their tenant as well as find actionable guidance on how to troubleshoot and resolve these user-impacting issues.

Administrators will also be able to proactively monitor which devices and users might be using outdated versions of the Teams client to be able to move them to the latest and most secure version

Additionally, this information can also be sorted, filtered, and exported to a .csv for further analysis and troubleshooting. 

This will be only accessible to limited admin roles: Teams Administrator, Teams Communication Administrator, and Teams Communications Support Engineer.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically with no admin action required.

Ensure you and the required users have access to the above-mentioned roles or request to enable this new feature for more roles.
For more information, refer to our documentation:

• The Teams client health dashboard in the Teams admin center.
• Update monitoring in the Teams admin center.

New LDAP query events will be added to the IdentityQueryEvents table in Advanced Hunting to provide more visibility into additional LDAP search queries running in the customer environment.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide, GCC, GCC High, DoD): We will begin rolling out in early March 2025 and expect to complete by mid-March 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

This update may lead to an increase in activity within the Advanced Hunting IdentityQueryEvents table for LDAP queries. If you have custom detections related to these queries, you may see a higher number of triggered alerts.

This update is available by default. 

[What you need to do to prepare:]

We recommend that you review your existing custom detections to ensure they align with your objectives. If needed, you can adjust your query accordingly.

More information: Create and manage custom detection rules in Microsoft Defender XDR

Your Microsoft Intune account has been updated to the latest service build.

[How does this affect my organization:]

You will see the service release number updated in the Tenant Status blade of the Intune admin center soon. We have introduced some changes that we are excited for you to try out.

[What to do to prepare for this change:]

Click additional information below to learn more about what’s new in this service release. We will continue to update the What’s new page with any features that are released between now and the next monthly service update. Learn more by reviewing features highlighted in the latest Intune What’s new 2502 (February) blog and how the Intune service updates each month is described in the Microsoft Intune Service Updates blog. 

Additional Information:

Intune What’s new

What’s new 2502 (February) blog

Staying up to date on Intune new features, service changes, and service health

The cloud.microsoft domain was provisioned in early 2023 to provide a unified, trusted, and dedicated DNS domain space to host Microsoft’s first-party authenticated SaaS products and experiences. This post is to inform admins that the following Microsoft products and scenarios are now available at the cloud.microsoft domain, in parallel with the previous domains.

Microsoft Places (https://places.cloud.microsoft/)

A full list of product experiences already being delivered on this domain can be found here: Unified cloud.microsoft domain for Microsoft 365 apps – Microsoft 365 Enterprise | Microsoft Learn.

[When this will happen:]

The services above are already available on cloud.microsoft, in parallel to their previous domains. You can expect the previous domains to be redirected to cloud.microsoft in the coming months.  

[How this will affect your organization:]

• The cloud.microsoft domain has been a part of standard Microsoft network guidance on domains and service endpoints since April 2023. If you are currently following this guidance, this change should not impact users in your organization using the above applications under the new domain.

• Users will be redirected to applications under cloud.microsoft domains gradually and automatically. No specific user action is required. Links to the previous domains are backwards compatible and continue to be supported. Users may notice that the new application domains are lacking the “.com” extension. This is by design, as “.microsoft” is Microsoft’s own top-level domain – and this exclusivity allows for additional security and protection against spoofing

[What you need to do to prepare:]

• Educate users to recognize and expect cloud.microsoft as a key domain for Microsoft cloud experiences. You can refer them to What is cloud.microsoft? – Microsoft Support for more information.

• If your organizational websites, tools, or other materials reference the old URL, those links will be automatically redirected. However, it would be good practice to update those assets to avoid user confusion.

• Partner with developers of in-house Teams apps – including those that run on Outlook and Microsoft 365 – to take the actions described in Action required: ensure your Microsoft Teams apps are ready for upcoming domain changes so the apps continue to function on the new domain. 

• Admins should ensure that connections to *.cloud.microsoft are not blocked from their clients and enterprise networks. This should require no action if standard Microsoft network guidance on domains and service endpoints is being followed. 

The user privacy setting for optional connected experiences, already available in other Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft 365 apps, will soon be available in Microsoft Outlook on the web.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 467248.

[When this will happen:]

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

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

After the rollout, to configure the privacy setting for optional connected experiences, users can go to Settings > General > Privacy and data > Privacy settings:

On the Privacy settings screen, select the toggle for Turn on optional connected experiences:

This privacy setting applies across all devices where users are signed in with the same work or school account.

As an admin, if you have already made optional connected experiences available to your users in the Microsoft 365 Apps admin center, this setting will be turned on for Outlook on the web when users receive this rollout. Learn more:

• Use policy settings to manage privacy controls for Office for the web applications – Microsoft 365 Apps | Microsoft Learn
• Overview of Cloud Policy service for Microsoft 365 – Microsoft 365 Apps | Microsoft Learn

NOTE: If a user has already turned off this setting in another Outlook or Microsoft 365 app, this setting in Outlook on the web will also be turned off when the user receives this rollout.

[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

• About privacy controls for optional connected experiences: Overview of privacy controls for Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise (will be updated before rollout)
• About Office on the web policy settings, including the new settings for Outlook on the web: Use policy settings to manage privacy controls for Office for the web applications (will be updated before rollout)

Coming soon for Microsoft 365 Copilot: Users will be able to search their past Copilot chat sessions.

A Microsoft 365 Copilot license is required to use this feature. This message applies to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app for Windows desktop and to Microsoft 365 Copilot on the web.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 388371.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling out early March 2025 and expect to complete the rollout by mid-March 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Before this rollout: Users can only skim and scroll though their Copilot chat sessions to find a desired session.

After this rollout: Users will be able to type keywords to search their chat sessions. As a user begins typing, session results will appear based on the keyword(s), and users can select the session that corresponds to their search.

This change will be on by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

If you prefer to disable Copilot Chat for your tenant, review these instructions in Manage Copilot | Microsoft Learn.

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: Before rollout, we will update this post with new documentation.

Coming soon to Microsoft Teams: As part of our updates to the attendance report service for Teams meetings, we will implement a one-year retention policy for meeting attendance reports. After this rollout, all meeting attendance reports will be stored for one year after meeting end date to align with the Microsoft privacy policy. Before this rollout, meeting attendance reports did not have a retention policy.

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

[When will this happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide, GCC, GCC High, DoD): Available now.

Attendance reports for events created before November 1, 2024, will remain accessible until late August 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Please note that the updated retention policy will also impact on Microsoft Graph API requests for attendance reports. Data availability will align with the retention period.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

If you want to apply the one-year retention policy now, contact the Microsoft Support team.

To ensure you have access to attendance reports for all meetings created before November 1, 2024, we recommend that you download attendance data using the Attendance tab. Note: There is no bulk download option. Learn how to access the attendance report for your event: Manage meeting attendance reports in Microsoft Teams – Microsoft Support (will be updated before rollout)

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.

1. Navigate to the ‘My flows’ tab, then select a flow.
2. Access the flow’s properties, then select the ‘general flows properties’ tab.
3. Click the ‘Let Copilot create description’ button and Copilot will analyze the flow and generate a description.

1. Locate the appropriate flow, then select ‘details’ from the flow menu.
2. From there, select ‘Edit’, then click the ‘Let Copilot create description’ button and Copilot will analyze the flow and generate a description.

To reduce the risk of misuse and abuse of Exchange Online resources and ensure service availability for all users, we’ll soon introduce new tenant-level outbound email limits, known as the Tenant External Recipient Rate Limit or TERRL. The TERRL restricts the number of external recipients a tenant can send email to per day. If the limit is exceeded further messages sent to external recipients from the tenant will be blocked until the volume for the last 24 hours drops below the quota. A tenant’s TERRL quota is calculated based on the number of email licenses a tenant has purchased. Here is the formula used to calculate a tenant’s quota:

500 * (Purchased Email Licenses^0.7) + 9500

To help admins plan and track their outbound email volume, you’ll find a new report in the Exchange admin center: EAC > Reports > Mail flow > Tenant Outbound External Recipients Rate. This report shows the current volume of external recipients, your tenant’s daily quota, how much of the quota is used, and the number of recipients that were blocked if the limit was exceeded. The report will also show if enforcement for the limit is enabled or disabled. For example, for tenants who have more than 500 email licenses it will show “Disabled” until March 31st, the day we’ll start to enable enforcement for tenants who have more than 500 licenses.

[When this will happen:]

This change will roll out in progressive stages over the month of March as per the following rollout schedule:

[How this will affect your organization:]

If your tenant exceeds its daily outbound sending limit further messages sent to external recipients will be blocked and senders will receive one of the following bounce messages (also known as Non-Delivery Receipts or NDRs):

• Trial tenants: 550 5.7.232 – Your message can’t be sent because your trial tenant has exceeded its daily limit for sending email to external recipients (tenant external recipient rate limit)
• Non-trial tenants: 550 5.7.233 – Your message can’t be sent because your tenant exceeded its daily limit for sending email to external recipients (tenant external recipient rate limit)

[What you need to do to prepare:]

Check the report in the EAC to see your tenant’s quota and current daily outbound email volume and whether or not any messages will be blocked once the TERRL is enabled for your tenant. If your current outbound email volume is well below the quota, you don’t have to do anything. If your outbound email volume is near or exceeding your quota, consider using Azure Communication Services email for high-volume email to external recipients instead. ACS email which offers significant advantages and features for high-volume email, especially for external recipients. Messages sent using ACS email are not counted against your Tenant External Recipient Rate Limit quota.

For more information about the Tenant External Recipient Rate feature and report please see this blog post:

• Introducing Exchange Online Tenant Outbound Email Limits

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

The migration to app-centric management using the Migration Wizard (Phase 2) started rolling out in late November 2024 and completed rolling out in mid-December 2024. Administrators are now able to start the migration themselves using the wizard. The automatic migration for customers with only a global permission policy (Phase 1) will complete by end-March 2025 and those with multiple permission policies (Phase 3) will begin in April 2025

Detailed documentation for the migration process is available at App centric management to manage user access to Teams apps – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn.

App centric management introduces new admin settings to control who in the tenant can install Teams apps. First, admins can set a default value for new apps that are published to the Teams app store. Second, admins can manage apps for users, groups, or everyone in the organization. This feature replaces the existing app permission policies and provides admins with the ability to manage access to the app individually. The app permission policies for existing customers are migrated to maintain existing app availability in the tenant. 

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 151829 

[When this will happen:]

This feature will gradually roll out across three major phases.

Phase 1: Auto-migration for only single policy customers – This is applicable for customer with only a global permission policy. The roll-out has started and will be complete by end of March 2025.

Phase 2: Self-migration – admins of our customers can do self-migration using the Migration Wizard. This is the preferred way for customers to have tenant admin to be in the loop of migration. The migration Wizard is available to all customers now till end of March 2025. If you need more time to prepare for self-migration, please reach out to support.

Phase 3: Auto-migration for all customers – This is application for customers who have not completed self-migration in Phase 2. This is targeted to start in April 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Starting with this release, you can:

1. Manage Teams apps for selected set of users, groups or all users in the organization.

2. Set the default value for new apps published to Teams app store for each of the app types: Microsoft, third-party and custom apps.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

No action needed for phase 1 tenants with Global permission policy only. More information will be provided for phase 2 and 3 tenants in a follow-up communication before launch.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timelines below. Thank you for your patience.

Microsoft Teams users will soon be able to control how they get notified in meeting chats through RSVP to their meetings. When they decline a meeting, they will not receive notifications or see the chats in chat list; when they accept a meeting, they will receive notification for all new messages. This release of Microsoft Teams Meeting ID will be rolling out across Microsoft Teams Desktop, Mobile and Web and will provide an additional way for users to control their chat list by selecting which meetings they want to receive message updates from.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 161739

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release will begin rolling out early April 2025 (previously mid-March) and expect to complete by mid-April 2025 (previously late March). 

Worldwide will begin rolling out mid-April 2025 (previously late March) and expect to complete by late April 2025 (previously early April). 

GCC will begin rolling out mid-April 2025 (previously late March) and expect to complete by late April 2025 (previously early April). 

GCC High will begin rolling out early April 2025 (previously mid-March) and expect to complete by mid-April 2025 (previously late March). 

DoD will begin rolling out late April 2025 (previously early April) and expect to complete by early May 2025 (previously mid-April).

[How this will affect your organization:]

You will not receive notifications or see chats from meetings you declined. You will be able to set how you want to be notified for meetings you RSVP with Accept or Tentative from Microsoft Teams settings.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

You might want to notify your users about this new capability to control meeting chat notifications by RSVP to meetings. 

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

In Microsoft 365 apps for the web, users can see their tasks in a grid view and can update details inline in To Do on web and To Do app inside Microsoft Outlook.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 381749

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide, GCC, GCC High, and DoD): We will begin rolling out late April 2024 (previously early April) and expect to complete by mid-April 2025 (previously mid-February). 

[How this will affect your organization:]

When users open To Do on web within Microsoft Outlook, they will see their tasks in a tabular format or grid. They can continue to have the list view if preferred.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

There is no action needed to prepare for this change. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation as appropriate.

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

You are receiving this message because our reporting indicates you may be using new Microsoft Outlook for Windows in your organization.

Coming soon for new Outlook for Windows: an updated People Hub with a modern contact management experience that will retrieve and display high-quality, complete, coherent, and up-to-date information about the people that matter the most to you.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 413114.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted release: We will begin rolling out mid-April 2025 (previously mid-February) and expect to complete by mid-May 2025 (previously late February).

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

Before this rollout: The People Hub can contain multiple entries for the same contact and organizational profile information may not be included.

After this rollout: The People Hub will contain a unified view of a person with profile enriched contacts and auto-hidden duplicates. To access the People Hub, select the People icon from the left side of the new Outlook for Windows.

As part of the new contact management experience, your contacts will automatically be enriched with profile information from your organization’s directory and other sources. We have updated the profile card with a new Manage sources feature where a user can manage links to the contact sources:

After a user selects Manage sources, the user can manually Unlink contact sources, Edit contact sources that are not from their organization, and manage sources.

Also, to improve the contact management experience, contacts that are exact duplicates will be automatically hidden.

These changes will be on by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

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

After the feature is rolled out, please ensure that you are using new Outlook for Windows to get access to the updated People Hub.

Learn more: Add, find, edit, or delete a contact in Outlook – Microsoft Support (will be updated when rollout begins)

#newoutlookforwindows

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

View and monitor Loop usage in the tenant through existing Microsoft 365 admin usage dashboards.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 421611.

[When this will happen:]

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

Once available, administrators can view and monitor Loop usage in the tenant through the existing Microsoft 365 admin usage dashboards.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

There is nothing you need to do to prepare. These changes will roll to your tenant automatically.

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the content. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon in Microsoft Purview AI Hub: Data assessments provides a way for admins to drive data security outcomes by intersecting the sensitivity of data with actual accesses by users and providing remediation actions.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 464997.

[When this will happen:]

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

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

Data assessments will be added to the left navigation in the Purview AI Hub. A default assessment is initiated on the first visit to Purview AI Hub, and admins can create custom assessments at any time:

Data assessments results show metrics like total user accesses, types of sharing links, if files are labeled, and if sensitive info types are found:

Remediation actions on the Protect tab provide guidance on how to take steps to protect the data:

This feature is on by default and available for admins to configure.

[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 admins about this change and update any relevant documentation.

Learn more: Microsoft Purview data security and compliance protections for generative AI apps

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

Microsoft Copilot in SharePoint’s page creation feature leverages large language models (LLMs), data in Microsoft Graph, and best practices to help users create engaging web pages. This feature is available to users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 418126.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out mid-February 2025 (previously mid-January) and expect to complete by late March 2025 (previously late February).

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

Before rollout: The Page with Copilot menu option does not appear in SharePoint’s +New menu.

After rollout: Users with Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses will see the Page with Copilot menu option in SharePoint’s +New menu, allowing them to create page content.

With Copilot in SharePoint’s page creation, users can leverage LLMs, Microsoft Graph data, and templates, as well as existing documents, to generate high-quality page content. Users can also use prompts with integrated design ideas. This feature upholds enterprise data security and privacy commitments.

Feature highlights

Template-based page creation with grounding data: Users can use a prompt box to create pages based on templates (and specify their own data sources):

Prompt for design ideas integration: Users can enter a prompt to create pages with integrated design ideas:

Licensing and control

This feature is part of the Microsoft 365 Copilot suite and is enabled by default for licensed users. Admins can disable the feature by deselecting the Microsoft 365 Copilot for SharePoint service plan in the Microsoft 365 admin center.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout. You may want to inform users and update any internal documentation as needed.

Before rollout, we will update this post with revised documentation.

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

We are introducing a new entry point to Viva Connections from the SharePoint app bar, which will enhance the integration between the Intranet and Viva Connections.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 468290.

Screenshot of Viva Connections on SharePoint App Bar feature

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out late January 2025 (previously mid-January) and expect to complete by early February 2025 (previously late January).

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

General Availability (GCC, GCC High, DoD): We expect to complete by late February 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

After the rollout, end users can easily and seamlessly navigate to Viva Connections via any SharePoint site. 

Note: This feature will only be available to customers who have a configured and published dashboard and an enabled Viva Connections experience on their tenants. This feature will be on by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout.

We recommend creating awareness about this feature with your users by sending a News post.

You may want to update any relevant documentation.

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon to Microsoft Teams: Add a Loop workspace tab to standard channels enabling your team to brainstorm, co-create, collect, and organize content—together in real time. Everyone in the Team will have access to the Loop workspace, even as Team membership changes, and the workspace will adhere to the governance, lifecycle, and compliance standards set by the Microsoft 365 group backing the team. This message applies to Teams on Windows desktop, Teams on Mac desktop, and Teams on the web.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 472022.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out late March 2025 (previously late February) and expect to complete in early April 2025 (previously early March).

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

After this rollout, all users with the Loop app enabled on Teams will receive this experience by default.

To get started, users can select the plus sign (+) at the top of the Teams channel and select Loop from the list.

With this rollout, we will support these features:

• Creating a new workspace for a standard Teams channel where the workspace membership is the Channel group membership.
• Adding pages, files, and links to the workspace, collaborating with others, and sharing pages as components in Teams chats and channels. Users will be able to complete all their Loop workspace workflows in Teams.
• Recreating the Loop workspace tab in the channel, in case someone removes it by mistake.
• Deleting the Team will delete the attached Loop workspace. The workspace will be restored if the Microsoft 365 group is restored.
• If the user adding the Loop app to a channel does not have the appropriate license or permission to create a workspace, the user will be blocked from adding the app.
• The Loop workspace created in a Teams channel will automatically receive the sensitivity label of the Microsoft 365 group at creation time. With this rollout, when the label of a Microsoft 365 group changes after workspace creation, the label will not be automatically propagated to the workspace’s Microsoft SharePoint Embedded (SPE) container. Admins can update labels for these workspaces in the SharePoint admin center.
  • Coming soon in late February: When the label of the Microsoft 365 group changes, that update will automatically propagate to the SPE container for the workspace within 24 hours. We will update this message when this feature is available.

[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.

If you want to block the Loop app in Teams, this will remove the Loop tab applications in channels and the Loop personal app in Teams. To learn more: Overview of Loop workspaces storage and permissions | Microsoft Learn

If you want to keep the Loop application in Teams but disable to ability for users to create Loop workspaces, follow these instructions:

1. Sign in to the Microsoft 365 Apps admin center at https://config.office.com/ with your Microsoft 365 admin credentials.
2. Select Customization from the left pane.
3. Select Policy management.
4. Create a new policy configuration or edit an existing one.
5. From the Choose the scope dropdown menu, choose either All users or select the group for which you want to apply the policy. Learn more: Microsoft 365 Groups for Cloud Policy in Manage Loop components in your organization | Microsoft Learn.
6. In Configure settings, choose your desired setting for Create Loop workspaces in Loop:
   • Disabled: Users cannot create Loop workspaces in Teams. (When disabled, the Loop app will open Loop components in Teams.)
   • Enabled or not configured: Users can create Loop workspaces in Teams.
   • Not configured = Enabled
7. Save the policy configuration.
8. Reassign priority for any security group, if required. (If two or more policy configurations are applicable to the same set of users, the one with the higher priority is applied.)

Learn more

• Manage your apps in the Microsoft Teams admin center – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn
• Related message center post: MC929022 Microsoft Loop – Require Existing Microsoft 365 Group for New Loop workspaces (published November 2024)

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the content. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon for Microsoft Teams: We are updating our default policy settings for transcription for new tenants. Before this rollout, the setting was off by default. After this rollout, the setting will be on by default. This change applies to new global policies created for new tenants. Existing policies in the Teams admin center will not be changed; however, tenants that have not customized any part of their meeting policies for Teams meetings will be impacted.

• Tenants without customized policies: The new default settings will apply, and these tenants will be impacted by this change.
• Tenants with customized policies: Policies for user-level assignments or group-level assignments will remain unchanged and unaffected.

This change is designed to streamline the adoption of transcription and enhance the use of all AI features. This change will align transcription with the default policy for recording, which is also enabled by default in Teams admin center. This message applies to Teams for Windows desktop and Teams for Mac desktop.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 468282.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide): We will begin rolling out late February 2025 (previously early February) and expect to complete by late March 2025 (previously mid-February).

[How this will affect your organization:]

After this rollout, transcription services will be more accessible to users, allowing them to turn on and use transcription as needed during meetings. Transcription will not be automatically activated for every meeting.

For new tenants, transcription will be enabled by default when admins set up their global policies. New tenants will automatically have the transcription policy turned on when they start. Existing tenants without a global policy will also have the policy turned on by default.

Transcription policy on by default in Teams admin center. Admins can turn off the policy if needed:

[What you need to do to prepare:]

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

Before rollout, we will update this post with revised documentation.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

We are updating the ‘Modern Workplace – Autopatch Client Setup’ script used by Windows Autopatch. Currently, this script installs the ‘Microsoft Cloud Managed Desktop Extension’ and ‘Windows Autopatch Client Broker’ applications, which share the same script for post-device registration readiness checks. The updated script will uninstall the old ‘Microsoft Cloud Managed Desktop Extension’ application and upgrade the existing application for improved performance.

[When will this happen:]

We will start the updates in mid-February 2025 (previously early February), and they will continue through mid-March 2025 (previously late February).

[How will this affect your organization:]

The ‘Windows Autopatch Client Broker’ will replace the ‘Microsoft Cloud Managed Desktop Extension,’ offering better scalability and performance through Windows Autopatch. We are continuously working to enhance functionality. There will be no immediate impact on your environment.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

To ensure the new application runs successfully, ensure that the new endpoint – device.autopatch.microsoft.com – is added to your allow list.

For more information, see Configure your network | Microsoft Learn. We will start the updates in early February, and they will continue through the end of the month.

If you have any questions or concerns, or need assistance, file a service request by visiting the Microsoft Intune admin center.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have postponed this release to ensure the proper customer experience. The rollout timeline has been updated below. Thank you for your patience.

We are pleased to inform you that we will roll out two improvements to enhance compliance and security for voicemail messages in Microsoft Exchange.

This change is related to three products: Microsoft Teams calls, Microsoft Outlook/Exchange, and Microsoft Skype for Business calls. Results will be visible in Outlook/Exchange email messages.

[When this will happen:]

General Availability: We will begin rolling out mid-May 2025 and expect to complete by mid-June 2025.

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

[How this will affect your organization:]

1. The From: field of voicemail email messages will be updated to comply with the latest RFC standard, RFC 6854: Update to Internet Message Format to Allow Group Syntax in the From: and Sender Header Fields. According to this compliance standard, the Internet message format must always include an address in the From header field.

Example:

• Before this rollout: +44 28 7584 5695 <442875845695>
• After this rollout: +44 28 7584 5695 (Unverified) <[email protected]>

2. To strengthen trust and security in voicemails received from external PSTN calls and from federated tenants, Unverified and External tags will always be added to the From field of voicemail messages in the mailbox.

Note: This rollout applies to voicemail messages in Microsoft Exchange received from external PSTN calls and calls from federated tenants.

Example of the From field in voicemail message if PSTN caller was not found in Entra ID contacts:

• Before this rollout: +44 28 7584 5695
• After this rollout: +44 28 7584 5695 (Unverified)

Example of the From field in voicemail message if PSTN caller was found in Entra ID contacts:

• Before this rollout: John Smith
• After this rollout: John Smith (External)

Example of the From field in voicemail message for calls from federated tenant:

• Before this rollout: John Smith
• After this rollout: John Smith (External)

Example of the From field in voicemail message for anonymous Skype calls:

• Before this rollout: Anonymous
• After this rollout: Anonymous (Unverified)

Note: Both improvements will always be on by default.

[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. You may want to notify your users about this change and update relevant documentation.

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the image of the new experience to show as intended. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon: To make the language more friendly and relevant for all users, we will update the user experience for “More information required” during authentication method registration (Microsoft Entra).

[When this will happen:]

General Availability (Worldwide, GCC, GCC High, DoD): We will begin rolling out early March 2025 and expect to complete by late March 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

Before this rollout: Before a user starts the process of registering a new method for multifactor authentication and/or account recovery, they typically encounter this screen first:

After this rollout, users will encounter this new screen instead:

This change will be available by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before the rollout. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation that includes screenshots of the current UX.

Updated March 3, 2025: We have updated the content. Thank you for your patience.

Coming soon for Microsoft Teams: When you have several peripheral devices connected to Teams, the one you use to answer a call will temporarily become the main device that will sync with Teams when using the device’s buttons. After the call, the original device selected in Teams settings will take over again as the main device. After this rollout, users can use multiple native Bluetooth devices can be confident that call controls will function correctly with all of them.

This message applies to Teams for Windows desktop.

This message is associated with Microsoft 365 Roadmap ID 475853.

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out early March 2025 and expect to complete by late March 2025.

General Availability (Worldwide, GCC, GCC High): We will begin rolling out mid-March 2025 and expect to complete by mid-April 2025.

[How this will affect your organization:]

After this rollout, users will be able to switch between their connected peripheral devices when answering a call without manually changing the selected device in Teams settings. 

This change will be available by default.

[What you need to do to prepare:]

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

Learn more:

• Phones and Devices for Microsoft Teams – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn
• Personal peripherals for Microsoft Teams – Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn

Updated March 4, 2025: We have updated the rollout timeline below. Thank you for your patience.

We are excited to announce that users will soon be redirected to new streamlined and efficient home pages for Microsoft Word for the web, Microsoft Excel for the web, and Microsoft PowerPoint for the web (WXP). The new home pages are available now at:

• https://word.cloud.microsoft
• https://excel.cloud.microsoft
• https://powerpoint.cloud.microsoft

[When this will happen:]

Targeted Release: We will begin rolling out in early April 2025 (previously late February) and expect to complete in late April 2025 (previously mid-March).

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

[How this will affect your organization]

During the rollout, some users will be taken to the new WXP homepages. The WXP entry points being changed are the Microsoft 365 app launcher, the Microsoft 365 AppBar, and the Microsoft 365 Apps page. The new homepages are offered in 39 languages with additional languages arriving in the coming months. The previous Microsoft 365 launch pages for WXP for the web will continue to be available at the existing URLs until after the rollout is complete.

App launcher showing the apps that will have new home pages:

[What you need to do to prepare]

There is no preparation needed by IT Admins. We appreciate your cooperation and look forward to providing you with an improved user experience.

This rollout will happen automatically by the specified date with no admin action required before or after the rollout. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation.