Microsoft Adding Beauty Filters, Meeting Locks, And Push-To-Talk Features To Teams

In addition to an improvement in audio quality, Microsoft is devoting itself to further functions that are supposed to reach the popular communication tool Teams this summer. Among other things, there is talk of a “Push to Talk” feature, meeting locks, and various camera filters.

According to the Microsoft 365 roadmap, the Redmond company is currently working on more than 160 functions for Teams. For many users, the focus is likely to be on improving audio quality. The so-called “Music Mode” was already announced at the beginning of July, which is supposed to enable a sampling rate of 32 kHz with 128 kbps. The introduction is still planned for this month. A walkie-talkie function with push-to-talk options should also arrive by the beginning of fall, but it will apparently only be available for Microsoft’s Teams app on smartphones at first.

Windows Latest reports that, apart from new audio features, the “Lock the Meeting” function has been completed. This allows organizers to quickly close and reopen running video conferences. Accordingly, latecomers can be prevented from entering meetings. This function is likely to play a major role in the education sector in particular. The first indications are that it is currently being slowly rolled out to more users.

Finally, Microsoft lists “Video Filters” among the upcoming Teams features, which are to be used within the communication tool in the course of August. In the description, the option is reminiscent of a beauty filter found in many smartphone camera apps: “Before joining a meeting, you can use filters to subtly adjust lighting conditions and smooth facial features to customize your appearance.” We can’t wait to see the end result of the filters.