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Force Teams desktop client update

Silver Contributor
Hi all,

I've recieved several questions about this and I'm also seeing too many topics about it here in the community.

We all know about the update process for Teams as described here
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/teams-client-update and here https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/update-microsoft-teams-535a8e4b-45f0-4f6c-8b3d-91bca7a51d... for example.

But sometimes you're just stuck as nothing happens when trying to clear the cache, reset the app, update and/or reinstall.

This is an easy way to force an update of the desktop app (even though most updates happen backend).

1. Look for the latest version seen, one place to do it https://whatpulse.org/app/microsoft-teams
2. Copy the version number and paste it in the link below and hit enter.

In my example, and at the time of writing, I'm updating to version 1.3.00.33971.

https://statics.teams.cdn.office.net/production-windows-x64/1.3.00.33971/Teams_windows_x64.exe

I've been struggling with this myself some time ago knowing features being released backend but didn't show up in my desktop client. After this process the client was updated and the features appeared for me as well.

Hope this will prevent some of you going mad.
36 Replies

This is great, @ChristianBergstrom  Thanks for posting!

Hello, and thanks! Don’t know how widespread the workaround is tbh, but I’ve stumbled across the issue so many times I just had to share how to force a version upgrade.

Rephrased the subject to be more specific.

Thank you, @ChristianBergstrom 

Just to emphasize two limitations posted at the links you shared:

@ChristianBergstrom Given the client is in user land is there any good way to detect the existing version and then install silently via login script?  I have the stuck update on about 500 users. 

@ChristianBergstrom I don't think this is a very good idea, it's quite possible you could get a version that isn't going to be deployed to your deployment ring and therefore wouldn't be supported. 

 

It's pretty unlikely that anyone is stuck, I've only seen it where there are firewall blocks preventing download. I would suggest the following to check if updates are fine

 

1. Click on the Me menu and Check for Updates

2. Go to the Teams icon in the status area, right click and choose Get Logs

3. Look for a message that says "App up to Date"

 

As long as that's there then there are no updates being offered to your client at the moment, so you are fine as you are. Teams versions are an increasing number, but only certain version make it to the widespread deployment ring which is supported. For example if you opt in to Public Preview or TAP programmes then you get more frequent and less tested client versions.

 

There has been a long gap in updates, it's entirely correct, don't mess with it. There would be an article on Docs if this was a supported proceedure.

@Steven Collier Hey Steven, fair enough. But tend to disagree to some extent.

 

I'm not saying it's a supported procedure. I'm aware of several end-user experiences where they have received the "app up to date" when checking for updates, still being on a version from say November, missing settings such as "Accounts & orgs" for example. Not being able to add another account. 

 

Obviously nothing official but as I experienced it myself thought it could help someone out.

@Steven Collier we have 500 users with the error "Looks like you'r on an old version of Teams. Update in X days to continue using the app"

I'm sure the issue is environmental, but Premier support has been running in circles for the last 2 weeks. and I'm down to the wire on the error message. 

as for not in our ring.. I'm pulling the version number from an updated machine in our tenant, so hopefully that version is good for us.

the documented locations of logs.txt comes up empty for most of us. we will look if the method you show works. as if we can track down the error we can fix the root cause. 

right now I'm just trying to get us past this error, so a manual install via login script is my backup plan if premier cant get a better solutions in the next 24 hours. 

@Steven Collier
Let’s say people use this not recommended way and get a not supported version as it’s out of the ring. Shouldn’t that be corrected with the next automatic update? As I mentioned, I’ve used it myself and my Teams desktop app is updating accordingly.

@ChristianBergstrom, I have also updated my Windows desktop Teams client using this 'forced' method and ongoing updates are indeed working.  In my case, I did so to take advantage of a new Teams feature (7x7 grid) a few months ago when selecting 'Check for updates' in-app wasn't updating to a newer version while my colleagues already were using a newer app version (and downloading a new installer directly from https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/download-app wasn't making any difference either).

For completeness, as this post doesn't yet mention it, I thought it might be helpful to reference https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/troubleshoot-installation#troubleshoot-update-issues, which explains some troubleshooting steps related to Teams app updates that you might want to try before 'forcing' an update.

If the above troubleshooting steps don't help resolve the issue, I would suggest it's best to raise a case with Microsoft Support :thumbs_up:

@rs_oakford Hi, thanks for the input! Good to hear that you also used this procedure and that the updates are working as intended afterwards. I would really appreciate some input from @Steven Collier on that. Come on Steven, you can do it! :)

 

And I agree with you @rs_oakford  about the MS docs troubleshooting. It should be a first step.

 

The main reason I posted the above was only to provide an option to "force". Not to recommend it as something you should do as a routine to bypass the automatic update flow.

 

@Microsoft_Teams_team what's your take on this?

@ChristianBergstrom Yes the updates would continue, and Teams will offer you an update available to your ring with a higher version number, so effectively you will fall back in line with support from that point.

 

Teams updates are deployed on a percentage basis, first 10% and so on. This is both to avoid load at the Microsoft end and to allow rollouts to be paused if a significant support issues is created. I don't know but assume that is what happened in December, a versions was rolling out then deployments stopped. The point being the mechanism is there to protect people and the service.

 

@PDSDavid I'm sure that Premiere will come up with a supported answer, that warning means you are reaching the limit, 90 days I think. If you just download the Teams client again doesn't that take you back to more recent version? You can deploy that however you like. Also if you look in the log you will see the URL that Teams is checking for a version (it looks a lot like those Bec is creating but with your current version number), if you log into Teams in a browser then open a tab to that page you might be able to see what in your infra is causing the block, the service will return some JSON if there is an upgrade, and the location the client should fetch it from.

Great! As I suspected. Really appreciate you getting back confirming. Thanks!

@Steven Collier well we got hit with some bad update in the past. the -s1-s1 folder has to be deleted on all the effected users to get teams to update properly again.

still keeping the forced update in my back pocket incase we ever hit a point we cant fix in time. to many users ignore the error and assume IT knows. 

@Steven Collier Your faith in MS to just get everyone onto the best version for them is .. interesting. Given MSs history of just abandoning clients with major issues due to bugs, it seems unlikely that they are going to do any differently with Teams.

Indeed, I manage around 450 desktops and I see a wide range of versions installed going from 1.2 through to 1.4. I reinstalled my own desktop yesterday with the latest version on the MS page and I've ended up with 1.4.0.2879, while I have desktops which are running 1.4.0.3484 - which I can't find anywhere. My machine also says I have the latest version, which is obviously wrong as I had a more recent version before the wipe and reinstall.

 

I was forced to wipe Teams from my own machine because it was crashing every few hours. Nothing was displayed when it crashed. The window just closed. Wipe and reinstall has made no difference. It still crashes. So do colleagues.

 

I would like to get everyone up to the same version and to not use the profile installed version... but no, this is almost impossible. In theory when you install the machine-wide version then the profile version should be removed. Never happens. Updating the machine wide will sometimes result in the profile version also updating, sometimes not.

 

The idea that MS will just manage from the cloud this is laughable.

 

What was wrong with just having an MSI installable product, like every other product?

 

@IanMurphy48 Hi, thanks for your input. Bear in mind that it isn't necessary to all be on the same version though as it's the availability of features that really matters. But I do understand your frustration.

 

There's an option for MSI installation just to put it out there Install Teams using Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager - Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Docs

 

My personal opinion is that C2R and the update channels is a massive improvement compared to MSI installations. Unfortunately Teams has it's own update flow which is kind of out of control, even though you can choose to deploy it with M365 apps for ex. you can't be granular.

@ChristianBergstrom  I have no problem with having the users running 1.3.0.3xx or 1.3.0.2xx versions, but what I see happening is the same as is happening with Win10. Most installations just update, but you end up with a significant number which are just orphaned and never update. With win10 you download an iso and update from that and... no problem, so why didn't they auto update?

 

I'm seeing the same with Teams. Hundreds are running a more or less recent version, but then maybe a couple of dozen machines are seemingly 'stuck'.

 

The msi installer simply does nothing to either the machine wide or profile installed versions when executed on these machines. Frustrating.

@IanMurphy48 the MSI "machine wide" installer (included with o365) just creates a run once scheduled task in all local profiles including the default to triggers the profile install on login. 

there is no such thing as a machine level install of teams. 

This is why a login script is required to do any maintenance. Unsupported or not, the OP is quite useful info. although I recommend instead of looking for the latest version from that linked site. I would use the version from a healthy version in your environment. 

best response confirmed by ChristianBergstrom (Silver Contributor)
Solution

@IanMurphy48 

 

I would suggest you check out the recently shared blog that explains a little about the update process at Why do I not see a feature but my colleague does? - Release Processes Microsoft Teams.

 

As explained it's entirely normal to have different versions while deployments are happening slowly, things are a little complex at the moment due to some delays, an apparent rollback and new versions through TAP and Public Preview. So if your users are guests in other tenants that may be in TAP you could be getting versions from there, I'm a guest in the microsoft tenant so my versions vary wildly.

 

As @PDSDavid correctly explained the Machine Wide installer is more like a stub to create the installation for each user. Also the regular msi will be a little behind the newest version you may see, it trails rollout and doesn't lead.

 

It is quite unlikely that any specific build would cause the issues you describe, and that would seem to be largely verified by it remaining after a reinstall. I would be looking into driver versions perhaps.

 

Teams update process is unorthodox in enterprise, more like a consumer app, but this is deliberate from Microsoft to manage the far faster pace of change in what is really a web application in a wrapper. In my experience across Teams at many organisation it is very robust, the only issues I've seen are in locations where network restrictions are preventing access to the download service. Microsoft were planning to provide some more admin control, allowing you to control the day of the week and so on, but I think this has been pushed down the list due to priority works to support Teams being used by schools during the pandemic.

 

 

@Steven Collier 

>It is quite unlikely that any specific build would cause the issues you describe,

>and that would seem to be largely verified by it remaining after a reinstall.

>I would be looking into driver versions perhaps.

 

It is *extremely* likely that a specific build would cause the issues I describe. Its called a bug. Thats why we update software. Its the principal reason for updating software.

Drivers being out of date is just being ridiculous. You can always say that about anything. Why would only Teams, not much more than an advanced chat app, be affected by this magic driver issue when all the other stuff, using more advanced system features, is stable. Also, in my own case I know my driver set is up to date as I do update whenever something is available. On a client machine it would be less often, but in my case its all up to date and Teams still crashes constantly with no log.

 

I'm basing this on supporting hundreds of desktops. If applications like Solidworks, office or the myriad of programming tools people use crashed, the users would be on the phone. They're not, but a lot of people do report that they missed teams chat messages because it was closed. Just Teams, which makes it pretty unlikely that all those desktops (with different models, different makes and different drivers) have issues which just happen to affect Teams and only Teams.

 

 

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best response confirmed by ChristianBergstrom (Silver Contributor)
Solution

@IanMurphy48 

 

I would suggest you check out the recently shared blog that explains a little about the update process at Why do I not see a feature but my colleague does? - Release Processes Microsoft Teams.

 

As explained it's entirely normal to have different versions while deployments are happening slowly, things are a little complex at the moment due to some delays, an apparent rollback and new versions through TAP and Public Preview. So if your users are guests in other tenants that may be in TAP you could be getting versions from there, I'm a guest in the microsoft tenant so my versions vary wildly.

 

As @PDSDavid correctly explained the Machine Wide installer is more like a stub to create the installation for each user. Also the regular msi will be a little behind the newest version you may see, it trails rollout and doesn't lead.

 

It is quite unlikely that any specific build would cause the issues you describe, and that would seem to be largely verified by it remaining after a reinstall. I would be looking into driver versions perhaps.

 

Teams update process is unorthodox in enterprise, more like a consumer app, but this is deliberate from Microsoft to manage the far faster pace of change in what is really a web application in a wrapper. In my experience across Teams at many organisation it is very robust, the only issues I've seen are in locations where network restrictions are preventing access to the download service. Microsoft were planning to provide some more admin control, allowing you to control the day of the week and so on, but I think this has been pushed down the list due to priority works to support Teams being used by schools during the pandemic.

 

 

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