There’s SO MUCH going on in Microsoft Teams as a product, how do you even start to talk about it?! In this blog series I’m going to attempt to work my way through the letters of the alphabet, talking about as many features as I can think of in turn.

If you’re new to Teams, hopefully this helps you find your way around. If you’re not new to Teams, maybe you’ll still get some new ideas. Here we go…

J is for … Join.

Much like Paul Simon’s 50 ways to leave your lover, there are almost as many ways to join a Microsoft Teams meeting (or that’s how it feels anyway). There’s no slipping out the back or dropping off a key – let’s look at what the options are:

Meeting invite links

If you receive an invite to a Teams meeting (usually they arrive via email), there are a few different links you can click to join:

One of them being ‘click here to join the meeting’, which helpfully does what it says on the tin.

If you are on your mobile, you can use the audio only link to make a good old fashioned phonecall into the meeting (Remember phone calls? Remember your mum answering the house phone by repeating your home phone number? Another blog for another time…)

You’ve also got helpful links to download Teams if you don’t already use it, or join on the web, which will open up Teams in a browser instead of the desktop application.

You can access these links by opening up the invite in your calendar.

Outlook reminders pane

If you’re using outlook, and the meeting invite has a reminder set (the standard one is usually 15 minutes before the meeting start time), you’ll also get a reminder pop up in your Reminders pane:

As you can see there is a button right inside the reminders pane itself giving you the option to ‘Join Online’ that particular meeting. This takes you straight to your meeting join screen in Teams, without having to open and click around the invite itself.

Outlook calendar

When the time gets closer to your meeting start time, you’ll also find that a Join button appears in the appointment slot for the meeting on your Outlook calendar.

You can press that button and get to the pre-meeting ‘choose your audio and video options’ join screen straight away.

This button also appears in the Teams Calendar too!

Teams Calendar – appointment

If you go to your Calendar tab in Microsoft Teams, you can click on any meeting you find there and you will get a join button to press and join the meeting:

Again this will take you straight to the pre-meeting screen to choose your audio and video options before you join:

Teams calendar – join with an ID

If someone has sent you a meeting ID, you can also use the button at the top of your Teams Calendar to join a meeting:

You’ll need to copy and paste the meeting ID and passcode and then you will have the option to join the meeting:

The meeting ID and passcode is usually found at the bottom of the standard Teams meeting invite too.

Handy hint; if you need to find this information while you’re in a meeting so that you can copy and paste it to someone else for them to join, you can find it under the 3 dots, More, and Meeting Info:

Join button in Chat

If the meeting is a recurring series and there is an existing chat with the other participants, you will also find a Join button at the top of the meeting chat that will take you to the pre-meeting screen for that meeting.

This won’t necessarily work if you are external to the organisation where the meeting invite was sent from though.

Someone can ‘drag’ you into the meeting

If your colleagues are in an existing meeting and they decide to rope you into it, they can ‘drag’ you into the meeting and you’ll get an incoming call toast at the bottom of your screen. When you accept it, you’ll be put straight into the meeting.

If you are in a meeting and you want to drag someone in, Microsoft shows you how to do that here: Invite people to a meeting in Teams – Microsoft Support

Use a room device  

If you’re in a meeting room, you may have access to a Teams Room device, which you’ll also be able to join the meeting from. There are too many different ones to dive into for this blog though!

So there you have it. Ok so not quite 50 ways to join a Teams meeting but I bet you didn’t think there were ten!

Go on then, let me know which ones I’ve missed 😊

If you liked this blog and want to catch up on the rest of the A-Z series so far, you can find posts A-F here: 

https://lyndsay.blog/2023/03/01/lyndsays-a-z-of-microsoft-teams-a-is-for/

https://lyndsay.blog/2023/03/07/lyndsays-a-z-of-microsoft-teams/

https://lyndsay.blog/2023/03/16/lyndsays-a-z-of-microsoft-teams-b-is-for/

https://lyndsay.blog/2023/03/22/lyndsays-a-z-of-microsoft-teams-c-is-for-part-1/

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – C is for… (Part 2) – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – C is for… (Part 3) – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – C is for (part 4!!!) – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – D is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – E is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – F is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – G is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – H is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Lyndsay’s A-Z of Microsoft Teams – I is for… – Lyndsay Ansell’s Blog

Happy Teamsing!