Or, for a more complex interaction, use /pop and then select a person to pop out that chat history into a separate window. Use /chat or even to send a simple message directly from the Search Bar. You’ll have to choose the right Team, then the right Channel on that Team, then reopen the document, find your place, and finally resume working.īy using a Teams Search Bar command, you can avoid all the navigation and just quickly send your message. But when you switch back to the Teams tab? You’re probably not going to drop right back into your document. You could click over to the Chat tab and have your conversation. You and your colleagues can all simultaneously add to and edit a Word document.īut let’s say you’re in the middle of those edits and you need to reach out to a single colleague via chat for a clarification. Teams allows you to open files shared within a Team directly in the Teams application. Say you’re deep into one of your Teams, collaborating on a Word document or a PowerPoint presentation.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always toggle between those things so elegantly. One of the best things about Teams is also one of its weaknesses: it can do so many things. When You Might Want to Use Search Bar Commands But being able to do so from the search bar can save you time and keep you focused on your current primary Teams task. Of course, you can access many of them another way. You might be surprised by the number of functions you can access in this way. You can launch a brand-new call or chat with someone without navigating away from what you’re doing, too, with /call and /chat. For example, you could quickly set your status to available or away, using /available or /away.

Doing so will bring up a long list of commands you can type.

To begin a Search Bar Command, simply click in the Search Bar and type the forward slash key (that’s this one: / ). Search Bar Commands are a way to avoid some of that confusion - and to work more quickly.

Even still, Teams environments can get complex, and it can be easy to become lost or disoriented when switching between Teams or app areas. You can access most of these functions with the tabs or buttons along the left side of the app. If you’ve worked with Teams much at all yet, you know that the program has many different functions. Microsoft Teams Search Bar Commands: What They Are

Microsoft teams app bar