macOS name change: Microsoft Teams to Microsoft Teams classic MDM Impact

Originally posted by Microsoft Oct 17, 2023 Uncategorized 0 Comments

With the recent GA of New Teams on Mac, there are changes that impact the management of some tenants regarding new Teams and Microsoft Teams classic (formerly Microsoft Teams). New Teams, now with the app name Microsoft Teams (work or school), exists side by side on macOS with Microsoft Teams, now with the app name Microsoft Teams classic. Via an in-app toggle, users can seamlessly switch between New Teams and Microsoft Teams classic.

However, there are implications for tenant administration that have arisen that administrators should be aware of.

Bundle IDs for new and classic Teams remain the same:

1. The bundle ID for Microsoft Teams classic remains the same:

   com.microsoft.teams

2. The bundle ID for Microsoft Teams (work or school) is:

   com.microsoft.teams2

   Note: this is the same bundle ID for the preview version which was named Microsoft Teams (work preview)

MacOS .app file name changes with the recent GA of new Teams:

1. Microsoft Teams classic– formerly Microsoft Teams:

   Changed from:

   Microsoft Teams.app
   

   to

   Microsoft Teams classic.app

2. New Teams– now officially Microsoft Teams (work or school):

   Changed from:

   Microsoft Teams (work preview).app
   

    to

   Microsoft Teams (work or school).app

Important MDM scenarios these changes can impact:

If you have an MDM implementation that periodically checks whether Microsoft Teams is installed on a given Mac device in your tenant based upon the .app name, and then installs a version of Teams if it isn’t present, then you may find that devices can have two version of Teams classic installed on the device: Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Teams classic.

If this happens, it should not require any action to remove the duplicate old Microsoft Teams version. When the old Microsoft Teams version next updates, the machine will be left with a single Microsoft Teams classic version on the device.

Prevention:

To prevent the above scenario from initially happening or repeating, admins should change the implementation to use the Teams bundle ID rather than the .app name when checking for the presence of Teams on a device. Alternatively, admins can update the .app name check to Microsoft Teams classic.

Important:

The new Teams currently has the .app name Microsoft Teams (work or school).app, but in the coming months it will change over to Microsoft Teams.app, so it is strongly recommended to use the bundle ID going forward in all cases to avoid a repetition of the above scenario.

Transition Timeline for Microsoft Teams Classic:

Daily users of the now Microsoft Teams classic, should have automatically received an update that changed the name of the app from Microsoft Teams to Microsoft Teams classic in September via built-in custom updater.

User who rarely open Teams should have recently received the update via Microsoft Auto-update which was released on 10/10/23

The latest Microsoft Teams classic build can be downloaded here: Teams_osx.pkg download. 

Builds with the original “Microsoft Teams.app” naming convention – 626463 and earlier

Builds with the new “Microsoft Teams classic.app” naming convention – 627656 and later

Important! Ensure that any new MDM deployments that you may use include a build that uses the Microsoft Teams classic.app convention, meaning with a build 627656 and later.

For general information on upgrading and policies related to deployment of the new Teams, see:

Upgrade to the new Teams using policies

For specifics on New Teams for Mac, see:

New Teams for Mac – Overview and prerequisites

The download link for the latest new Teams GA build: MicrosoftTeams.pkg download. 

For the remainder of calendar year 2023, the Microsoft 365 BusinessPro Suite installer will continue to include Teams classic. In early 2024, Teams classic will be replaced with the new Teams client BusinessPro Suite installer.

Message ID: MC681884