Top 10 keyboard shortcuts to make you a Microsoft Teams super user
Published May 13 2020 08:00 AM 420K Views

With more people on Teams than ever, you may be wondering how to become an even bigger super user. We asked the Teams team to share their favorite keyboard shortcuts that help them stay efficient. Check out the top 10 shortcuts for meetings, chatting, and navigation below!

 

When you are in a meeting

We want to make sure your focus is on the meeting content rather than figuring out how to share your screen. Below are some shortcuts to make it easy for you to switch your camera on or off and quickly mute yourself if there is any background noise. This will help your meetings run more smoothly.

 

1. Ctrl + shift + M – Mute/unmute yourself

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2. Ctrl + shift + O – Turn on/off your camera

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*The Images were taken with the new modern meeting experience which will be rolling out soon. These commands will still work in your current interface.

 

 

When you are chatting and collaborating

We want to make it easy for you work with your colleagues. With these shortcuts, you can easily start conversations, search for content, and quickly edit messages.

 

3. Ctrl + N – Start a new chat 

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4. ^  Hit your arrow key and it will edit your last message sent (without needing to click on “…”) 

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5. Ctrl + O – Attach a file

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When you are navigating

We want to decrease the number of clicks and quickly get you to where you want to be within Teams. These shortcuts will help you move between your chats, teams, and calls, and search of information quickly.

 

6. Ctrl + 1+ 2 + 3 – Navigate up and down the left navigation rail. (i.e. Ctrl + 1 = Activity feed; Ctrl +2 = Chat; Ctrl + 3 = Teams etc.)

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7. Ctrl + E – Quick access to the search bar at the top of Teams.

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8. Ctrl + / –  See all of the commands that you can use to easily navigate to different locations, access content, or set your status. 

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When you want to express emotion

We want to make it easy for you to share your emotions through Teams. If you can’t find the right emoji in our emoji library below the message box, here is a shortcut to find many more!

 

9. :word – Type a colon “:” immediately followed by a word to discover additional emojis (e.g. :person or :apple)

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Interested in other shortcuts?

10. For more shortcuts, type Ctrl + . to see all of them or click on your profile in the top right hand corner and click keyboard shortcuts. Click here to learn more. Comment below with your favorite shortcut!

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43 Comments
Bronze Contributor

Thanks for the :word functionality to express emotion. However, there seem to be some flaws when mentioning words starting with a character in use for other icons. Some examples are :d, :o and :p. How can I get the emoticon for the word :person, which starts with the already used :p character combination?

thank you! find my 10 cents here in my blogpost how I am using shortcuts with Elgato Stream Deck https://ragnarheil.de/elgato-stream-deck-and-microsoft-teams-keyboard-shortcuts/

@Harold van de Kamp  I found if you type "fast" it will work, but seems that those reserved emoji should detect that you type an extra character after the :d for example. 

Iron Contributor

I'm with @Harold van de Kamp , I can't figure out how to use :person or any word that starts with p?

Copper Contributor

What is de keyboard shortcut for the new hand raise function?  Will be the next key on my stream deck. The Elagato Stream Deck and profile function in  Stream Deck is a great productivity tool to accompany me in my Teams sessions. 

Microsoft

I love up arrow ⬆ to edit the last message. Just like a CLI.

Copper Contributor

For some reason, I can't quote a message to reply directly to the message o the Teams desktop App? Is there a shortcut for this? 

Brass Contributor

Hello @Harold van de Kamp and @Rob Barker. I find I can get around this :d, :o, :p limitation by typing, say, :per in a different program (e.g., Outlook, or the command line) and then copying and pasting that back into Teams for further refinement.

Iron Contributor

Thank you @HedmanD that does work. Although it's silly we'd need to do that hack to make this work; Microsoft does need to address this issue. But thank you for teaching us this workaround!

Copper Contributor

What would be great is for Windows Shortcuts as well.  The ability for a windows shortcut key to bring up your active call window and bring back focus to front is key.  

Copper Contributor

Hi, @Harold van de Kamp@Rob Barker - just type : and be ready to type fast (really fast!!!) at least 2 more characters ;)

Copper Contributor

Amazing stuff! 

Steel Contributor

A lot of these shortcuts don't work for me ... ALt+Shift+C does not go to the Compose box, neither does Ctrl+Shift+X expand it. Alt+Shift+R does not reply to a thread ... very disappointing. Especially now that Microsoft is rolling out the new behavior that the compose box opens expanded on a new conversation, we have people asking how to quickly collapse it again.

 

One that does work and that is really useful is the up arrow to edit the last message. Finding the ... to get to the edit button is often a nightmare and very slow.

Copper Contributor

@Kreera House in Teams section 'R' or 'C' works without Alt + Shift ;) I like it very much!

 

Steel Contributor

@K.Nartautas  - You're right: 'R' works as long as I'm in a thread. Thank you!  But neither 'C' nor any of the other combinations work for me.

Copper Contributor

@Kreera House - 'C' starts a new conversation when I'm in a thread or just scrolling through the post... And it works for me in the desktop Teams app and web Teams app as well.

But, yes I must play and try with everything in Teams to discover useful features and understand how does it work again and again :xd:

Copper Contributor

Shortcuts are really helpful in real time. Apart from A,S,C,V there are N and O as well that we can't do without@

Steel Contributor

Thank goodness Ctrl+F works for find, too, like it does in every single other program in the world, with the exception of Microsoft Outlook for some reason. So why tell everyone the non-standard shortcut, Ctrl+E? This is just perverse.

Steel Contributor

Also, search still doesn't search in the Wiki pages. Unbelievable.

Steel Contributor

@Sean Ellis  - I see different behavior for Ctrl+E and Ctrl +F.

Ctrl+E places my cursor in the Search bar and prompts me to "Search for something, or type / for a list of commands" while

Ctrl+F only accepts a search word for search limited to the channel in which I was when I selected Ctrl+F.

Copper Contributor

Hi, @Harold van de Kamp@Rob Barker, @K.Nartautas@HedmanD , @Chris Webb For the :d and :p issue, you can do a Ctrl+Z when the :p or :d is converted to an emoji, it will revert back to the text you typed, and then you can continue typing.

Copper Contributor

Requiring a 3 key command to mute/unmute yourself on a call is ridiculous.  PLEASE give us an option to remap the keystrokes on the Mac version.  Or at least put the Mute/Unmute command onto the menu so I can create a keyboard shortcut to it myself.

Steel Contributor

@SoonerJohn- "PLEASE give us an option"

 

But that would allow the user control of their own experience. User control is one of the well-established 8 Golden Rules of UI design, but goes against the Teams One True UI prime directive: No choices. You can't muck up the One True UI by choosing your font, your notification sound, your colors, your minimum window size, your default search order, your emoji preferences ... so why would they let you choose your own keyboard shortcuts?

Copper Contributor

What is the shortcut key via keyboard to stop screen sharing on MS Teams without having to press stop sharing icon on Teams while the call is in progress

Copper Contributor

Regarding :d and other key characters:

@MarcelGosselin@Harold van de Kamp@Rob Barker@K.Nartautas@HedmanD , @Chris Webb

 

If you use a pop-out chat window for sending your messages this aggressive replacement of :d, :o, :p, :s, :x does not happen.

Copper Contributor

It would appear that the space bar (spacebar) works to mute/unmute, different from Zoom's PTT function.  Hooray.  Looking for similar video mute/unmute.

Brass Contributor

If you can't remember all these shortcuts or want to trigger them even if the Teams window is not in focus/ activated have a look at this post: 

https://tdalon.blogspot.com/2020/07/teamsy.html

Microsoft

The shortcuts are wonderful!  I love that it saves us the frustration of not being able to unmute ourselves because we can't find the mouse! LOL

Copper Contributor

Great shortcuts but would love the mute and unmute to be easier with just a tap of the spacebar. 

Copper Contributor

I'll second the request to be able to update keyboard mapping. Make these functions appear in the Mac menubar so we have the flexibility (and standar Mac behavior—even while the contents of the Teams window itself remain consistent. Also, having a global keystroke that can toggle muting would be very useful as bouncing around the screen across apps while participating in a call.

Brass Contributor

Would love to have a shortcut for leaving/ending the meeting. So that not everyone anxiously ;) steers their mouse to the Leaving button.

Brass Contributor

Nice. Just saw the Ctrl+Shift+B is already available in Teams to end the meeting! Might be good to add to Keyboard shortcuts for Microsoft Teams - Office Support as well @Microsoft_Teams_team 

 

 

Copper Contributor

 after you've typed :p and the emoji appears press Ctrl+Z (undo) and you will then see :p is back and you can carry on typing :person to get the list of emojis :stareyes:

Copper Contributor

Thanks 

Copper Contributor

I see there is a keyboard shortcut for sharing screens which is Ctrl+Shift+E but is there one to stop sharing screens?

Copper Contributor

Using Microsoft Edge and Ctrl+Shift+M does not work anymore. It opens the "Sign in as a different user or browse as a Guest" option from Edge. Does anyone know a solution to this?

Learn Expert

Windows Key + . for all the emojis on Windows (not just Teams) is great. Just discovered the logs keyboard shortcuts and I wonder if the Teams app vs web version keyboard shortcut issue has been addressed?

Microsoft

I'd love to be able to toggle mute and video with one keyboard shortcut - allowing me to swiftly pop in and speak and then pop out. (Think sprint stand ups in large teams) @Microsoft_Teams_team 

Copper Contributor

The Ctrl + N functionality now pops out a new chat window for me. Rather frustrating! Can't seem to find a way to change it back to opening a new chat in-line.

Copper Contributor

Great Post! Thanks. How can I find all messages that are marked as important?

Copper Contributor

How can I launch Teams from the keyboard? I use a Microsoft Natural keyboard and I'd like to map a path to a hotkey so I can launch Teams with the press of a key.

Learn Expert

John - Windows allows you to press Windows key + number corresponding to the position of an icon on your taskbar, so if Teams were the 3rd from the left you could press win key + 3 and that would open Teams!

 

Dan

Copper Contributor

Thanks, Dan! That'll do!

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‎Jan 26 2021 12:11 PM
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