At Ignite 2021, we announced the preview of Microsoft TeamsJS v2, which enables developers to extend Teams personal tab apps and message extensions to other parts of Microsoft 365. The SDK was made generally available at Build 2022.
Outlook for Android and iOS is making room for these upcoming apps and making it easier to find all your contacts, files, and more. You will see these changes roll out in separate steps, and we wanted to share where it’s all headed.
New tab bar
The most obvious change is the new tab bar at the bottom of Outlook for iOS and Android.
In addition to the existing Mail/Calendar/Search modules, a new “More” button is present. From More you can access Contacts, Files, and all your apps. The tab bar is completely customizable so you can make the most of how you use Outlook. You’ll see this new tab bar come in first with just Contacts and Files, before we add support for Apps.
Soon, Teams personal tab apps that support Outlook Mobile and have been added in Teams, Outlook for Windows, or Outlook on the web, will automatically appear in Outlook for Android & iOS. A mobile-specific store will come later. We will start with Android and roll out to iOS once available.
Search in Outlook will become feed
Search currently plays several roles, it is a search page, a content discovery location, and is the only way to navigate to Files and Contacts. We are clarifying the role of the search page as a vertically scrolling feed of news, content, ToDo’s, and more; to better convey this new experience, search will be renamed feed.
With search renamed as feed, the horizontal “slabs” will be replaced with a vertically scrolling view of all the content around you. Files and Contacts have moved out of the search page and into the tab bar. Search will always be available at the top of Mail and Calendar.
Fast Action Button (FAB) and Menu
The Fast Action Button (FAB) currently gives access to the most common action for a given module (for example composing a new message in Mail) with a single tap on an easy-to-reach button. A new menu button (“^”) will be added to the FAB that gives access to other important actions in an expanding menu. The primary FAB button expands for easy access when you open a module, and collapses to get out of your way as you scroll and navigate.
Sequencing
You’ll see these changes rollout in several phases as different parts become available. Most of them will come to Android before iOS.
First, Files and Contacts will move out of Search under the “More” button, and the default order will change to Mail, Calendar, and Search. You can re-order these apps by clicking “Reorder”.
Next, Search will be rebranded as Microsoft 365 Feed across Microsoft 365 products, including Outlook for iOS and Android. The search icon at the top of Mail and Calendar will remain the same.
Lastly, Microsoft 365 apps will become available in Outlook for iOS and Android. You’ll notice the “more” button renamed “Apps”.
