How to enable Microsoft Teams for users
Microsoft Teams, both the paid and the free version, allow a Team admin to invite other users. When you invite a user, you can assign them licenses, if they’re available, or you can simply grant them access to certain features in Teams.
Enable Microsoft Teams for User
Enabling Microsoft Teams for users can be simple if you’re using the app’s free version. If you have a business/enterprise/education license, it’s a bit more complicated.
1. Invite users Microsoft Teams – Free
To enable Microsoft Teams for users when you’re using the free version, all you have to do is invite them to join a team.
- Open Microsoft Teams.
- Go to the Teams tab.
- Click the more options button next to the team’s General tab.
- Select ‘Add member’.
- Enter an email address and select ‘Add [email] as member’.
- Click Add.
- An email will be sent to the new member and it will have a link that they can click to join the team.
2. Invite users Microsoft Teams – Enterprise/Education
With an Enterprise or Education license, enabling Microsoft Teams for users may be two-step process; a user must be added to the team, and then a Microsoft Teams’ license for the user must be enabled.
- Open Microsoft Teams.
- Select the Teams tab.
- Click the more options button next to the General channel.
- Select Add member.
- Enter an email, and select ‘Invite as member’.
- Click Add.
- Have the user accept the invite.
- Open the Microsoft 365 admin center.
- In the column on the left, select Users>Active Users.
- Select the newly added user.
- In the pane that opens on the right, go to the Licenses and Apps tab. If you have an Education license, you will have to choose the license type as well.
- Select a Microsoft Teams license to assign to the user.
- In the column on the left, expand Settings.
- Select Services & add-ins.
- Click Microsoft Teams in the pane on the right.
- In the panel that opens, make sure Microsoft Teams is On for your organization.
Conclusion
Users, especially those connected via AD accounts, will likely already be part of their respective organization’s team in Microsoft Teams however, they may only see features that are available for free. An organization must purchase licenses for each individual user and those licenses then have to be assigned to a user which isn’t something that can be done automatically. If a user can’t use certain features in Microsoft Teams, then it is likely because they haven’t been assigned a license or the license is newly assigned. A license will take 24 hours to activate.
