Forum Discussion
Changing Channel from private
Hi,
so after searching I cannot find the answer to this.
I've created a team that will have channels in it representing different projects.
I've made one channel private so that I can choose which team members have access to it.
But now, I want to revoke that and allow all team members to see the channel.
I can't figure out how though.
Other than deleting the channel and that isn't an option.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
- You can transfer any collaborated documents from one library to another, easily enough. But AFAIK you cannot transfer text chats.
If you REALLY need to retain the chat, the admin can download all Team chats in a CSV that you could cut down to just include chat from this channel and share it as an Excel file. Not quite as usable but at least the info and discussion isn't lost.
Alternatively, screenshot the messages you need to retain, or somehow look at retaining the channel but locking it to further discussion.
- Once you make a channel private, you cannot revet back to public...at least for now this is not a feature provided in Teams
- The reasoning behind this is that a private channel is in fact an embedded private team within that Team. If you look at sharepoint, this is a complete new site collection.
Although I understand, this is a bit frustrating to me personally.
Syncing the whole file structure is impossible this way.
I wanted to make some public channels private, but this is also impossible, just like the way around like Kev mentioned. I really hope some improvements to this are in the dev pipeline.- This has caused me more trouble than I expected. I'm still fairly new to Teams and SharePoint admin so maybe and there is a workaround.
Seeing as I can now NOT turn my private channel (proj1) back to public, I've had to create a new Team with a new channel called proj1. Ideally I need to move all the contents from the private channel in the other team into this new team/channel so I can continue to work with the relevant permissions/members applied.
Can anyone please advise on this?
Thanks for the info. I have the same issue. That's kind of annoying that I can't make my channels public.
jcgonzalezmartin This is interesting news as of now 🙂
- Even I have the same issue, any workaround would be highly appreciated
https://agatsoftware.com/microsoft-teams-channel-management/
It can move, merge, copy, archive and export channels
In addition, can change channels from private to public and vice versa
Also available in Microsoft Appsource.- Thanks. At least I know there is an app that can do this.
- When you create a private channel in a Team/Group it creates a whole new separate SharePoint site for storage. Really not the point about Teams and Groups, where the entire thinking is Groups with different audiences.
Since you can't undo it, IMO you're best of not doing it and creating a new closed Group for this subset of the audience, to maintain logic and a sensible structure. I am also going through this.. I wanted the channel private for the initial team pow wow and want to now change to public for go live and was not able to, the problem with creating a new channel is having to "move" all the files from one place to another which loses the date/history trail... this fix is needed to make it awesome!!kevjackson
A private channel in Teams is a special kind of channel and you cannot convert it back to a public channel. When you create a private channel, a new site is created on SharePoint.
Yup, totally understood the concept, but the reality is that we should be able to edit even if it is via the sharepoint site to make it more effective. But hopefully it will be looked at. 🙂 Thanks! Shepherd360
- Anyone have link to the suggestion/feedback for this on the new O365 feedback site (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/roadmap)? The UserVoice for it is dead.
Greg_Sohl Hello, here it is in the new feedback portal
Any updates here? Trying to figure out if I need to set aside some time to move everything into a new channel...
I am now reconfiguring all my teams. You cannot change channels from public to private or vise-versa as some instructions on the net elude to.
Also, when creating new channels, if you screw up and forget to make it private, you cannot delete it and then immediately create a new one with the same name. That may work after the retention period has expired.
I guess this was the only way to have private channels in Teams as it sits on top of SharePoint. I doubt Teams was actually meant to have private channels as it defeated the whole "Team" concept.
Poor planning from MS for not understanding what the community wanted and needed I am thinking.Shepherd360I don't think this is poor planning from MS.. it's just the way software is developed these days following agile methods. As requirements emerge, so they're recognised and implemented. If we followed the whole up front planning/design thing, we'd still be waiting for Teams and when it finally came out in three years time, it would be another Windows Vista or 8 disaster.
Nope, for all of it's problems, MS are probably on the right track for product development, it's us who have to understand agile development, what that means for our users and get the feedback fed back to MS in time.
- There is still no known way, CaseyMcD. Until now there is no way. The only way is to delete the channel.
One reason I have for wanting to change my private channel to public is because there is functionality iI can't have in the private channel. e.g. I can't have Forms or Tasks. I can have connectors but those are connectors to Forms in the main Team in which case it is no longer private.
When will Microsoft allow these types of apps to be used within a private channel?
thanks
Julie
- This discussion is about changing CHANNELS from public to private or vice versa - not about changing the TEAM privacy setting, which is easy to do as you've posted.
Not being able to control a channel's privacy is one of the stupidest things I have encountered about Teams. I understand "why", but not being able to change it back to public is just stupid. My opinion, of course.
