Obtaining Peak Teams Telephone Performance

This article addresses some of the factors that impact Teams performance when using the telephone aspect of the program. Many of these factors contribute to or take away from optimum audio and video performance. These factors can be summarized in the following categories:

Your Devices

If possible, ensure your device is a recent model and up to date.  Hardware platform, processor, memory and video processing capacity all impact performance.  In addition, make sure that you have a current operating system (OS) installed and that you are up to date with all patches, updates and service packs. You'll want to verify that any drivers/software are up to date with any communications peripherals you're using with Teams as well as verify that the device is Microsoft compatible prior to purchasing. Also, be sure you have the right devices selected in Teams that you want to use and be sure that those devices are set correctly in Windows.

Local Teams Client

Your Teams client determines the feature set you have available.  Make sure that you have the most current client for your platform and that you have applied all the available updates. Contact the ITS Help Desk or your assigned computer support for additional help. 

The Environment:

Environmental noise and poor lighting can contribute to our perception of a poor quality Teams call/meeting experience.  If possible, move to an environment more conducive to improving your Teams experience. The location should have proper lighting, quiet, and strong connectivity to the network you're using. 

The Network

Network connectivity is one of the most critical factors as well as the most common cause of problems impacting Team performance. Where are you located? Are you connected to a wired or a wireless connection? Do you have enough bandwidth (information carrying capacity)? Is the network congested (busy)?

Teams users moving from a wired connection to wireless will be dropped from their active Teams session. This can also occur for users when roaming on wireless networks when the individual moves from one wireless access point to another.

Below are some FAQs on basic troubleshooting if your run into issues using Teams phone


No Dial Pad

If you're not seeing a dial pad in Teams, either you're not licensed for Enterprise Voice (Teams Phone) or our Teams tenant and/or your local Teams client isn't recognizing your license. If you know you have Teams Phone (your local desktop support and/or the ITS Unified Communications team can verify this for you), it is highly recommended to start by fully closing Teams and re-opening the program. 

How do I fully close Teams?

Often when troubleshooting, you'll be asked to fully close Teams. However, simply closing your Teams window will not do this as the program will continue to run in the background. You can fully close Teams by going to the system tray, right-clicking the Teams icon and select "Quit Teams". You can also used Task Manger (Ctrl+Alt+Delete) and stop the program there. 

Fully closing Teams is often the first step when troubleshooting Teams woes, be the issues telephone related or not

How do I clear Teams cache?

If fully closing the program doesn't solve things, clearing your local Team's profile's cache is the next step. Go to Windows 11 settings --> Apps --> Installed Apps --> Microsoft Teams --> Advanced Options --> Reset.

Reset there are two options: one will attempt to repair the software and one will clear the app's data. It is recommend to try both. NOTE: Be sure that Teams is fully closed prior to doing either of these things. 

All External Calls are Routing to Voicemail

There is a setting you should verify in Teams if you're seeing this happening. Go to Settings --> Calls --> make sure this toggle switch is set to Off:

external off
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