Chat in Microsoft Teams

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Caution.JPG REVISION IN PROGRESS: This article contains useful information, but is being revised to reflect recent updates. Direct questions to TLT (tlt@winona.edu).

About this article

Chat can be used with anyone in the Minnstate System. All faculty, staff and students can be searched for to setup chats with them. Chats are private and they are not associated with Posts that are done inside of individual Teams. Chats can be one-on-one, with multiple people or a saved group of people. When you chat in a Team they are called Posts. These are seen by anyone with access to the Team.


Start a Chat in Teams

  • Open Teams and Use the Chat icon in the left nav
  • Start a New chat with the icon at the top of the Chat column. You can start one-on-one or group chats.

After the To: type in the last name of who you want to Chat with, you can add more than one name in this list. You can also start Chats by selecting someone from your list of previous conversations.

Type a new message field is now at the bottom of the screen.


Below the message field, there are options that you can use for formatting your message or ability to add GIFs and Emoji’s.

Create a Group Chat

If you have multiple people that you want to chat with, you can create a Group. Select the new chat icon at the top, next click on the down arrow in the far right to Create Group. Fill in the Group name and then add people to the group.

For more information on using Chat and Posts in Teams.

Chat within Channels - Posts

In every Channel within Teams there is a Post area. Everyone that has access to the Team can chat with each other in this threaded conversation area.

To post a chat message, type in the conversation box at the bottom of the screen. Below the conversation box, there are options that you can use for the formatting of your message or ability to add GIFs and Emoji’s.


In threaded conversations, you can Reply to a message so that conversations can be easily followed by anyone reading it. To reply to a channel message, select the little Reply link underneath the message.

Start a Video Call from Chat

Once you have started a Chat and added who you want to chat with, you can turn it into a video chat. Select the video icon in the upper-right corner to start the meeting. This will be a private video chat.

Start a Video Meeting from within Teams

From the Post area in any of your Team channels, go to the conversation box at the bottom of the screen. Below the conversation box there is a video icon for Meet Now. This will start a video call with anyone in your Team. Next you can invite someone from your Team to the video call. Once the meeting has started, anyone in the Team can join the meeting even if they were not invited. This would be similar to a meetings you have face-to-face with co-workers and someone from your team walks in to join you.

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