Microsoft Teams in 2025: Features, Licensing Options, and Add-ons

04 april 2025

As of March 2025, Microsoft Teams has received new updates including new features. Also, Microsoft has separated Teams from the Microsoft Office suites, which brings in new licensing options. This article will first go over the changes found in Microsoft Teams so far in 2025, and some frequently asked questions about the new licensing options for Teams. Then, the new licensing options to access MS Teams and the possible add-ons to Teams will be detailed. Finally, the updated hardware requirements to run Teams and its features will be mentioned.

2025 Features of Microsoft Teams

As mentioned previously, Microsoft Teams has received updates including new features, which will be described in this section. This includes features related to chat and collaboration, features related to meetings and events, as well as features related to hybrid work.

Chat & Collaboration

In terms of features related to chat and collaboration, there are a few new additions such as a unified interface across all chat and channels, helping towards streamlined collaboration. Also, custom sections can be implemented, allowing users to group conversations, bots, or AI agents into dedicated workspaces.

Next, new messaging features were introduced with the possibility to insert quick hyperlinks in group chats, the possibility to forward Loop components, app cards, and posts across Teams. Also, the latest update offers scheduled messages, allowing pre-programmed communications for channels.

Last feature regarding chat and collaboration, is the integration of Copilot, an AI powered assistant, helping with task automation and giving insights to improve decision-making.

Meetings & Events

Regarding meetings and events, Microsoft Teams has an enhanced capacity for large-scale events. This includes the support of up to 50 000 participants for webinars, town halls, and conferences, with integrated live chat and enhanced Q&A for improved engagement during events (Teams Premium only).

Also, new presenter tools are available, which allow Teams Rooms to join events as presenter, which enables the management of meetings from live meeting rooms.

Finally, extended language support has been added to MS Teams, which allows real-time speech-to-speech translations, helping towards global collaboration.

Hybrid Work

As hybrid work is becoming more and more important, Microsoft added multiple features helping the integration of hybrid work solutions. This can be seen through the enhancements of the video experience in Teams, enabling users to use multi-camera views, up to 4 simultaneous streams, or through the implementation of better cross-platform meeting capabilities, improving integration with other conferencing platforms.

Thanks to recent updates, Microsoft Teams also includes new calendars for improved scheduling and planning, which include features such as delegate access, print support, or the support for multiple time zones.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) about Teams licensing

As the licensing model for Teams has undergone significant changes in recent years, here is a few frequently asked questions about the licensing of MS Teams in 2025.

How is Microsoft Teams licensed?

Microsoft Teams is subscription-based with annual commitments. It can either be purchased through a Microsoft 365 bundle such as 365 Business Standard, or purchased as a standalone license such as Teams Essentials.

What are the main standalone licensing options for Teams?

There are two main standalone licensing options for Microsoft Teams, which are Teams Essentials and Teams Enterprise. While Teams Essentials offers all the basic features of Teams, the Enterprise version offers more advanced features and greater modularity with add-ons that can be easily implemented.

How did the licensing model of Teams change recently?

Since April 1, 2024, Teams is no longer included with Microsoft 365 Enterprise plans. It means that new enterprise customers have to purchase two barcodes to benefits from both 365 features, and Microsoft Teams.

Is it possible to use Microsoft Teams without a license?

For personal use, it is possible to access the free version of Microsoft Teams, which offers limited basic features. For business purposes, it is not possible to access Teams without the appropriate license.

What is the main difference between Teams Essentials and Teams Enterprise?

The main difference between Teams Essentials and Teams Enterprise is the target audience. Essentials is mainly designed for small businesses needing basic features, while the Enterprise version offers greater scalability for larger organizations, as well as more advanced features.

Is Teams licensing different depending on the country?

The new licensing model for Microsoft Teams applies to all countries where it is offered. Only exception is the add-on license Teams Phone, which depending on location, might not be available, or have different offerings.

How much does Microsoft Teams cost with the new licensing model?

All the different licenses and add-ons that are offered for Microsoft Teams are priced differently depending on the country and currency. Most licensing options for Teams are licensed per user, per month, and are to be paid annually. Please refer to Microsoft for more information on pricing.

Microsoft & Office 365 Licensing Options

Following competitive regulatory matters in the EU, Microsoft decided to unbundle Teams from its Office suites. This change comes with new licensing options in order to gain access to MS Teams and its features.

Microsoft 365 Business Suites

Regarding Microsoft 365 Business suites, Microsoft updated its offering by adding versions specifically design for the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland, which do not include MS Teams. This is true for all the declinations of MS 365 Business suites, respectively MS 365 Business Basic, MS 365 Business Standard, and MS 365 Business Premium, which can now be found under the ‘’EEA (no Teams)’’ reference. While Microsoft is now offering bundles without Teams, the original offer with Teams included is still available for purchase in the EEA for 365 Business suites.

Microsoft 365 Frontline Suites

Microsoft 365 Frontline Suites, the edition of Microsoft 365 designed to answer the needs of frontline workers, is following the same logic as for 365 Business suites. This means that Frontline suites are now available with, or without Teams. These changes apply to MS 365 F1, and MS 365 F3 bundles, which are referenced as ‘’EEA (no Teams)’’ for the versions without Teams.

Microsoft & Office 365 Enterprise Suites

Regarding Enterprise suites, the new offering differs from Business or Frontline 365 bundles. Microsoft is no longer offering the original Enterprise bundles in the EEA and Switzerland, respectively Office 365 E1, E3, and E5, as well as Microsoft 365 E3 and E5. So all the mentioned Enterprise bundles are now referenced as ‘’EEA (no Teams)’’ and have seen their price lowered in comparison to versions that previously included MS Teams.

Since April 2024, all new Enterprise customers who need access to Teams must purchase their Microsoft or Office 365 licenses separately from MS Teams licenses. This means that new Enterprise customers are required to purchase two different product keys in order to access both the Office offering, as well as Microsoft Teams. Regarding Enterprise customers who subscribed to a MS 365 or Office 365 bundle including Teams prior to April 2024, they will be able keep their full access to Teams, its features, as well as the support from Microsoft.

Standalone Teams Licensing Options

As Microsoft separated Teams from the Office Suites, new standalone Teams licensing options are available. This section goes through the new licensing options, their specific features, and compare them to one another.

Microsoft Teams Essentials

First licensing option that Microsoft offers for Teams, is Teams Essentials. This licensing option for MS Teams is offering all the base features of Teams, while keeping a low price-point for small businesses to benefit from enhanced communication and collaboration.

Included in Teams Essentials is the capacity to host up to 300 participants per meetings, meetings up to 30 hours with records and transcripts, and 10 GB of cloud storage per user. Also, this version of Teams features unlimited chats and guest access, easy calendar connection with either Outlook or Google, as well as strong data encryption for meetings, calls, and files. MS Teams Essentials is subscription-based, per user, per month, paid yearly.

Microsoft Teams Enterprise

Next licensing option for Teams is MS Teams Enterprise. This version of Teams is similar to Essentials in many aspects, such as the cloud storage of 10GB per user, unlimited chat and guest access, Outlook/Google calendar connection, as well as the encryption of chats, meetings, and files.

The main difference lies in the hosting capacities of Teams Enterprise, with up to 1 000 participants per meetings, with the possibility to have unlimited meetings with records and transcripts. With the increased capacity of MS Teams Enterprise, Microsoft targets larger businesses requiring enterprise-grade solutions for communication and collaboration. Also, this version of Teams is highly customizable as add-ons can easily be integrated to Teams Enterprise.

Add-ons are available both for Teams Enterprise and Essentials, but they have to be manually deployed in Teams Essentials, while Teams Enterprise offers easier integration and deployment solutions thanks to more advanced management tools.

Microsoft Teams Add-ons

In addition to the new licensing options for MS Teams, Microsoft offers a variety of add-ons for businesses to tailor Teams to answer their operational needs. This section describes the main add-ons offered for Teams, and their specific features.

Microsoft Teams Premium

Teams Premium is one of the add-on licenses offered by Microsoft. This add-on license is made for businesses that need advanced personalization of meetings, enhanced meetings experience for end users, improved protection for meetings, as well as advanced management and reporting capabilities.

Some of the most important additions of Teams Premium are premium events, such as Town halls and Webinars, allow to host larger scale events. For example, Town hall events can be organized with a Teams enterprise license, with up to 10 000 participants, but Teams Premium allows scaling up to 50 000 interactive participants, making Teams Premium the most scalable licensing option for Teams.

Also, it is important to mention that as an add-on license, Teams Premium will only work in combination with an Office 365 or Microsoft 365 subscription, and a Teams license such as Teams Enterprise. New customers must purchase a Teams license and a 365 subscription separately.

Microsoft Teams Phone

Next add-on license is MS Teams Phone. It is an enterprise-grade cloud phone system with Private Branch Exchange (PBX) capabilities, replacing traditional on-premises phone systems.

This add-on license integrates to Microsoft 365 and Teams to offer internal and external calling capabilities. For internal calls, Teams phone handles everything internally, thus avoiding the costs of using the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). For external calls, Teams connect to the PSTN thanks to additional PSTN connectivity licenses such as Microsoft Calling Plan licenses, enabling Microsoft as PSTN carrier. These licenses can be acquired through Microsoft.

In addition to PBX and external calling capabilities, Teams Phone allows end users flexibility by allowing to make and receive calls from any Teams compatible devices which include mobile phone, laptops, or IP phones. Also, Teams Phone bears advanced features such as call transfer, call queues, or merge function. Teams Phone can be acquired either through a MS Teams Phone Standard plan, which is priced per user and per month, or through a ‘’Pay-as-you-go’’ plan, which as its name suggests, is priced based on use.

Note that it is possible to add calling plans to Teams Phone licenses, or to bundle MS Teams Phone and Teams Calling Plans together. Also note that if the limits of a calling plan are reached before the end of the month, extra communications credits can be acquired through Microsoft. In order to access Teams Phone, a 365 license and a Teams license, such as Teams Enterprise, are required.

Microsoft Teams Rooms

Complete solution for hybrid work, Microsoft Teams Rooms allows the integration of physical rooms into collaborative environments thanks to hardware, software, and Teams integration.

Teams Rooms setups include devices such as certified cameras or touchscreens which can be acquired through Microsoft, and are integrated with Teams and Microsoft 365 to promote collaboration. In contrast to other add-ons and licenses, Teams Rooms requires both software and hardware. This means that to access Teams Rooms, Teams certified hardware has to be bought. Teams Rooms comes into two version; MS Teams Rooms Basic, and MS Teams Rooms Pro.

Teams Rooms Basic can be accessed with no additional charges after buying certified Teams devices. It offers all the basic features of Teams Rooms, allowing to organize hybrid meetings. The Basic edition of Teams Rooms allows to manage up to 25 licenses within one organization, or 25 certified device-equipped meeting rooms. On the other hand, Teams Rooms Pro offers more advanced features, such as AI integration to meeting rooms, which can improve overall meeting quality by managing audio and video through the Teams certified devices. It supports an unlimited number of Teams Rooms licenses, allowing the integration of a greater number of rooms. Also, thanks to advanced management tools available in Teams Rooms Pro, the management of an unlimited number of rooms is possible.

Note that Teams Phone Standard is included in MS Teams Rooms Pro as a default service, which means no additional Teams Phone license is required to benefit from its features. In order to use Teams Rooms, certified devices are necessary. Also, Windows 10 or a newer version of Windows is required to setup the Teams Rooms software.

Hardware requirements for MS Teams and add-ons

Regarding hardware requirements, most versions of MS Teams share their minimal hardware requirements, except for certain features and add-ons, for which better performing hardware is required. This section will cover the basic minimum requirements for MS Teams on both Windows and MacOS, recommended hardware for optimal performance, as well as the minimum requirements for advanced features and add-ons such as Teams Rooms.

Minimum Requirements for MS Teams

These are the minimum requirements to run MS Teams on Windows:

  • CPU: 1.1GHz minimum, 2+ cores
  • RAM: 4GB
  • Storage: 3GB available disk space
  • Display: 1024x728p minimum resolution
  • Graphics: Graphics hardware acceleration requires DirectX9 or later, with WDDM 2.0 or higher for Windows 10 (or  WDDM 1.3 or higher for Windows 10 Fall Creators Update)
  • Operating System: Windows 11, Windows 10 (excl. Windows 10 LTSC), Windows 10 on ARM, Windows 8.1. Windows Server 2019, Windows Server 2016, Windows Server 2012 R2. (latest Windows version recommended for support)
  • .NET version: Requires .NET 4.5 CLR or later

Minimum requirements for MacOS:

  • CPU: Intel Core Due or higher
  • RAM: 4GB
  • Storage: 1.5GB available disk space (HDD or SSD)
  • Display: 1280x800p minimum resolution
  • Operating System: Latest three versions of macOS supported

Additional requirements for video calls and meetings:

  • CPU: 4 cores
  • Proximity detection for Teams Rooms: Requires Bluetooth
  • Background video effects: Requires Windows 10 or processor with AVX2 instruction set

Additional requirements for Teams live events:

  • CPU: Intel Core i5, 7th generation, or newer
  • RAM: 8GB or more
  • Live streaming: Hardware encoder required

Recommended Configuration for Optimal Performance

In order to benefit from all the features of MS Teams with optimal performance, here are the optimal specifications to run MS Teams on Windows:

  • CPU: 1.6+ Ghz, 4 cores or more.
  • RAM: 8GB or more
  • Storage: 10GB of available disk space
  • Display: 1920x1080p recommended resolution
  • Graphics: DirectX 9 or later with WDDM 2.0 or higher
  • Operating system: Same as minimal
  • .NET Version: Same as minimal

 Recommended hardware for MacOS:

  • CPU: 4 core processor
  • RAM: 8GB or more
  • Storage: 5GB available disk space (HDD or SSD)
  • Display: 1920x1080p recommended resolution
  • Operating System: Latest versions of macOS

Hardware requirements for MS Teams Rooms

As Teams Rooms is unique in its requirements as it requires purchasing certified hardware such as cameras, or touchscreens, the requirements to run Teams Rooms are also differing with the classic requirements to run MS Teams. Here are the hardware requirements in order to run Teams Rooms, except for peripherals.

  • CPU: for Windows; Intel Core i5 (4 or 6 cores), for Android; optimized processors in certified systems
  • RAM: 4GB minimum, 8GB+ recommended
  • Storage: 128 GB SSD minimum for Windows systems
  • Display: 1024x768p minimum for touch panels or room displays, 1920x1080 recommended
  • Graphics: DirectX 9 or later with WDDM 2.0 or higher for Windows systems

In addition to classical hardware requirements, Teams Rooms requires certified peripherals such as cameras, touchscreens, and microphones. Depending on room size and use intent, different setups will be required. Here is a base guideline for room equipment.

  • Small room (2-6 persons): Compact setup, single display, single camera, and single microphone and speaker system.
  • Medium room (6-12 persons): Dual display, possibility for multiple cameras and microphones for better coverage.
  • Large room (12+ persons): Advanced setup, multiple large displays, multiple wide-angle cameras, multiple microphones and speakers.

All certified hardware for Teams Rooms can be purchased through Microsoft via their online shop.

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