M365 Changelog: Teams in-context Stores

MC501986 – The in-context stores are found in menus throughout the Teams experience that let users discover and install apps that support the specific context the user is in. For example, when a user opens the Message extension (ME) in-context store they are shown a selection of apps that have the ME capability. Discovering apps in the in-context Store keeps users in their flows and avoids unnecessary context switching.

When this will happen:

Microsoft has started rolling this out and will complete rolling out by late March 2023.

How this will affect your organization:

The value of the in-context stores can be summarized as following.

1. Users will be able to discover and acquire apps for a specific capability while staying in their flow.
2. Users can easily navigate to the Store if they can’t find what they are looking for in the in-context Store.
3. Users can search for apps for a specific capability in the entire Store catalog.
4. Users can launch apps they already install from the in-context store. 

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Figure 1 – Launching Tabs in-context Store from a group chat

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Figure 2 – Tabs in-context Store

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Figure 3 – Messaging Extension flyout

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Figure 4 – Messaging Extension In-context Store

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Figure 5 – @mention flyout in a channel

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Figure 6 – Bots in-context Store

What you need to do to prepare:

There is no action needed to prepare for this change. You may want to notify your users about this change and update any relevant documentation as appropriate.