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how to control visibility of presence with external organizations and users

Olson, Steven A 20 Reputation points
2026-01-23T13:26:24.88+00:00

i'm researching how to configure presence of local users by external users

Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Teams for business | Settings | Online status
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  1. Tamara-Hu 11,970 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator
    2026-01-23T14:38:01.05+00:00

    Hello @Olson, Steven A,   

    Thank you for posting your valuable question on Microsoft Q&A forum. 

    Based on your description, I understand you’re looking for a way to hide the visibility of presence information, such as Available, Busy, or Away, for specific internal groups when viewed by specific external organizations, while still allowing presence to remain visible to everyone else. 

    Please let me know if I misunderstood any part of your issue or if there are additional details you’d like to share.  

    Currently, Microsoft Teams does not support presence‑only controls at that level. Presence sharing with external organizations is tied to external federation. External users can see presence unless you turn on Privacy Mode, but Privacy Mode applies to the entire tenant and cannot be targeted to specific internal groups.   

    For your reference, please check: User presence in Teams - Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Learn 

    Microsoft does now support granular external access policies, which let you decide which internal users or groups can communicate with which external domains. If communication with an external domain is blocked for a specific group, that external organization will also not see presence for those users. However, this also blocks chat and meetings, not just presence. 

    For more information, please check: IT Admins - Manage external meetings and chat with people and organizations using Microsoft identit… 

    Because of that, the exact behavior you’re looking for isn’t available today, but your scenario is completely valid and would be very useful for many organizations. 

    If you would like to see this feature added in the future, I encourage you to submit feedback or upvote related requests in the Microsoft Teams Feedback portal.   

    • Go to Microsoft Teams · Community    
    • Sign in with your Microsoft account.    
    • Choose Send Feedback and fill in the form.     
    • Describe your suggestion clearly and concisely.    
    • Submit and optionally upvote similar ideas from other users.    

    Microsoft’s product team actively reviews customer submissions, and many improvements have been introduced based on user demand and real‑world usage scenarios. Submitting and upvoting feedback is the most effective way to help prioritize this feature for future updates.  

    In the meantime, you can check Microsoft 365 Roadmap for updating features in the future. I will also forward your feedback to the appropriate team for further consideration.         

    Please note that Q&A forum moderators do not have access to backend systems or the ability to change app behavior directly. Our role is to assist based on available documentation and guidance from Microsoft based on our knowledge.      

    I genuinely appreciate your feedback and share your goal of making Teams better and more user-friendly.      

    If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment". 

    Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.

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  1. Olson, Steven A 20 Reputation points
    2026-01-23T13:31:51.78+00:00

    i'm looking for how to hide visibility of presence for specific internal groups by specific external organizations while allowing visibility of presence to everyone else

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  2. Q&A Assist
    2026-01-23T13:26:32.66+00:00
    AI generated content. This question contains an answer created with AI from Q&A Assist. Learn more

    To control the visibility of presence information for local users by external organizations and users in Microsoft Teams, you can configure external access settings in the Teams admin center. Here are the steps:

    1. Access the Teams Admin Center: Go to the Teams admin center.
    2. Navigate to External Access: Under Users > External access, you can manage how presence information is shared with external organizations.
    3. Allow or Block Domains: You can either allow all domains or add specific domains to the Allow list under Meetings and chat with trusted Microsoft 365 organizations. This setting enables users in those trusted organizations to view your users' presence.
    4. Mutual Trust Requirement: Note that cross-tenant presence requires mutual trust; the partner organization must also allow your domain for presence visibility.
    5. Privacy Mode: Additionally, you can enable privacy mode, which restricts presence visibility outside your organization, regardless of external access settings. This can be managed using the Microsoft Teams PowerShell Module.

    By configuring these settings, you can effectively control the visibility of presence information for your users when interacting with external organizations.

    References:

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