Microsoft “actively working” on a Teams API

Microsoft are “actively working” on a developer API for Microsoft Teams. In a comment on UserVoice the idea was changing to “Working on it” with a note by “Suphatra”, who is the admin and main contact point at Microsoft with the Teams UserVoice community:

There’s no word on timelines, but the comment is already over a month old. There are 42 ideas currently in ‘Working on it’ status. Also, taking into account my blog post yesterday (Microsoft Teams External/Guest Access coming “in June”) this feature could very well be the “richer developer platform” which is scheduled for a June release.

An API makes a lot of sense and from what I’ve seen of the Teams client so far (see my post Under the Hood of the Microsoft Teams Desktop Application) an API already exists and is being used by the UI to get stuff done. There will be a bunch of work to be done in sanitising the API, making it suitable for public consumption, documentation etc. etc. but the building blocks mostly look like they are there. I think that if you really wanted to you could build an application today which called the API itself, though it would be a lot more work than if Microsoft supported an official API.

I’m excited to see this coming, it’ll only help with the appeal and usage of Teams and becomes an important part of the comparison between it and it’s rivals (such as Slack) in what is becoming a fiercely competitive space.