Manage Enhanced Teams Apps for Outlook from the Microsoft 365 Admin Center

Originally posted by Microsoft Feb 8, 2023 Uncategorized 0 Comments

In April 2022, Microsoft announced the Preview of Enhanced Teams Apps for developers to extend personal apps and message extensions to other parts of Microsoft ecosystem, like Microsoft 365 and Outlook.

Previously, admins in the targeted release program were managing their Enhanced Teams Apps for Outlook via the Teams Admin Center. We’re moving this experience to Integrated Apps on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center. Teams Admin Center will continue to remain the surface for managing apps on Teams clients.

When this will happen:

Users enrolled in the Targeted release program will have access to this feature, starting in mid-February 2023.

This feature will begin rolling out to Standard release customers in late March 2023 and expect to complete by early April 2023. 

How this will affect your organization:

In this first release, only global admins can manage Enhanced Teams Apps for Outlook from the Integrated Apps on Microsoft 365 Admin Center. Support for Teams will come in the following months.

All Enhanced Teams Apps will be allowed for Outlook users by default. As an admin, you can control how users install these apps from the store or you can pre-install apps for users to improve productivity. 

What are the new tools for Enhanced Teams Apps? 

On Integrated Apps in the Microsoft 365 Admin Center, we’re providing new management tools so that: 

1. Admins can block an Enhanced Teams app on Outlook for all users, so that it cannot be accessed by any individual with an enterprise account. Blocking an app overrides previous admin deployment or user installation on Outlook so that the app can no longer be used. 
2. Admins can unblock an Enhanced Teams app on Outlook to make it available for all users in the organization. Unblocking an app will revert it to the last saved availability and deployment status. 

What does this mean for your organization? 

1. Enhanced Teams Apps for Outlook will be allowed by default: 

   With Enhanced Teams Apps, we are leveraging the power of Microsoft’s ecosystem so that a single app can be deployed once but can be used across multiple platforms. We’re moving to a model where admins can make decisions at an app-level. We believe that the app-based model makes it easier for admins to control access to apps across the organization in a unified manner. 

   To edit the availability of an Enhanced Teams App on Outlook, admins can use the new controls on Microsoft 365 Admin Center. 

   To edit the availability of an Enhanced Teams App on the Teams client, admins can continue using the Teams Admin Center. 

   We’re not changing any default settings for Office add-ins or Teams apps. Any settings done in Exchange Admin Center for Outlook add-ins will continue to hold true. 

2. We will continue to honor Teams Admin Center policies on the Teams clients:

   We will continue to honor any existing settings made for a Teams app on Teams clients.

   Let’s take the example of the Foo Teams app that recently upgraded to an Enhanced Teams app that is now available for Teams, Outlook and Microsoft 365:

   	Impact on Teams, once Foo becomes an Enhanced Teams App	Impact on the Microsoft 365 App once Foo becomes an Enhanced Teams App	Impact on Outlook, once Foo becomes an Enhanced Teams App
   If you had previously blocked the Foo Teams App on Teams Admin Center	Users in your organization cannot download and use Foo on Teams.	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on the Microsoft 365 App. This can be controlled by admins on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on Outlook. This can be controlled by admins on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center
   If you had previously allowed the Foo Teams App on Teams Admin Center	Users in your organization can download and use the Foo Enhanced Teams App on Teams.	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on the Microsoft 365 App. This can be controlled by admins on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on Outlook. This can be controlled by admins on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.

   Now that Foo is an Enhanced Teams App, you can make changes to its availability from Microsoft 365 Admin Center.

   	Impact on Teams client	Impact on the Microsoft 365 App	Impact on Outlook client
   If you block Foo Enhanced Teams App on Microsoft 365 Admin Center	No impact. Users in your organization will continue to experience Teams behavior for Foo Enhanced Teams App based on the admin settings in Teams Admin Center.	Users in your organization cannot download the Foo Enhanced Teams App on the Microsoft 365 App, and cannot use any previously installed (by user/admin) Foo enhanced teams app.	Users in your organization cannot download the Foo Enhanced Teams App on Outlook, and cannot use any previously installed (by user/admin) Foo Enhanced Teams App
   If you unblock Foo Enhanced Teams App on Microsoft 365 Admin Center.	No impact. Users in your organization will continue to experience Teams behavior for Foo Enhanced Teams App based on the admin settings in Teams Admin Center.	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on the Microsoft 365 App. Users can use any previously installed (by user/admin) Foo Enhanced Teams App	Users in your organization can download and use Foo Enhanced Teams App on Outlook. Users can use any previously installed (by user/admin) Foo Enhanced Teams App

   In future releases, we will harmonize the Teams Admin Center and Microsoft 365 Admin Center for a unified experience of managing apps.

3. Admin-initiated deployment of an Enhanced Teams App is now managed in Integrated Apps in Microsoft 365 Admin CenterEnhanced Teams Apps can now be deployed by the admin via Integrated Apps. We’re reusing the Office add-in workflow for deployment, so that admins do not have to learn new models and can initiate their deployment tasks from a single place. In this release, the deployed Enhanced Teams App will be pre-installed on Outlook. These deployed apps will not show up on Teams at this time. Support for Teams will come in the following months. All other admin controls for deployment to specific users or user groups continue to stay the same for Office add-ins on Integrated Apps and Teams apps on the Teams admin center.

Message ID: MC512626