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Walkie Talkie app in Microsoft Teams

  • Article
  • Applies to:
    Microsoft Teams

Overview of Walkie Talkie

The Walkie Talkie app in Teams provides instant push-to-talk (PTT) communication for your team and is available on Android and iOS. Walkie Talkie allows users to connect with their team using the same underlying channels they're members of.

Only users who connect to Walkie Talkie in a channel become participants and can communicate with each other by using PTT. Users will continue to receive transmissions until they tap Disconnect. Walkie Talkie supports communicating in standard, open channels - it does not support or work on shared and private channels.

With Walkie Talkie in Teams, users can securely communicate with a familiar PTT experience without needing to carry bulky radios, and Walkie Talkie works anywhere with WiFi or cellular internet connectivity.

Note

Walkie Talkie currently is not available in China.

License requirements

Walkie Talkie is included in all paid licenses of Teams in Microsoft 365 and Office 365 subscriptions. For more information about getting Teams, check out How do I get Microsoft Teams?

Deploying Walkie Talkie

You can deploy and manage Walkie Talkie from the Teams admin center. Walkie Talkie is supported on Android devices with Google Mobile Services (GMS) and iOS devices.

Important

Deployment is a three-step process. You'll need to complete all three steps for your users to have access to Walkie Talkie.

Step 1: Make sure Walkie Talkie is enabled in your organization

You control whether the app is available at the organization level on the Manage apps page in the Microsoft Teams admin center. To confirm that the app is enabled in your organization:

  1. In the left navigation of the Teams admin center, go to Teams apps > Manage apps.
  2. In the list of apps, search for the Walkie Talkie app, select it, and then make sure the Status toggle is set to Allowed.

Step 2: Create and assign an app permission policy

Control which users in your organization can use Walkie Talkie by assigning permission policies in the Teams admin center. To learn more, see Manage app permission policies in Teams.

Make sure that Walkie Talkie is an allowed app in the permission policy, and that you assign the permission policy to all users that will need Walkie Talkie.

Step 3: Use an app setup policy to pin Walkie Talkie for your users

Step 3 depends on which license type your users have.

3 for E licenses: Use an app setup policy to pin Walkie Talkie to Teams

App setup policies let you customize Teams to pin apps that are most important for your users in your users.

To pin the Walkie Talkie app for your users, you can edit the global (Org-wide default) policy or create and assign a custom policy in app setup policy. To learn more, see Manage app setup policies in Teams.

Screenshot showing adding Walkie Talkie to the pinned apps list in the Add pinned apps pane.

3 for F licenses: Use the Tailored frontline app experience to pin Walkie Talkie and other apps to Teams

The tailored frontline app experience in Teams pins the most relevant apps in Teams for users who have an F license. Pinned apps include Walkie Talkie, Shifts, Tasks, and Approvals. By default, this feature is on, giving your frontline workers an out-of-the-box experience that's tailored to their needs.

The apps are pinned to the app tray at the bottom of Teams mobile clients where users can quickly and easily access them.

To learn more, including how the experience works with app policies that you set, see Tailor Teams apps for your frontline workers.

Network documentation

Walkie Talkie in Teams requires internet connectivity. The following network conditions are required for an optimal experience.

Metric Required
Latency (RTT) < 300 ms
Jitter < 30 ms
Packet Loss < 1%

As noted above, the quality of real-time media over an IP network is greatly impacted by the quality of the network connectivity, but especially by the amount of:

  • Latency - The time it takes to get an IP packet from point A to point B on the network. This network propagation delay is essentially tied to physical distance between the two points and the speed of light, including more overhead taken by the various routers in between. Latency is measured as Round-trip Time (RTT).
  • Inter-arrival jitter - The average change in delay between successive packets.
  • Packet loss - Packet loss is often defined as a percentage of packets that are lost in a given window of time. Packet loss directly affects audio quality—from small, individual lost packets that have almost no impact, to back-to-back burst losses that cause complete audio cut-out.

Expected data usage from Walkie Talkie is around 20 Kb/s when sending or receiving audio. When idle, expected data usage from Walkie Talkie is negligible.

Walkie Talkie devices

Frontline workers often need to speak and receive Walkie Talkie calls even when their phones are locked. This experience is possible through specialized devices with a dedicated PTT button.

Headsets

Note

Users will need one of the following to use BlueParrott headsets:

  • Teams iOS version: 4.16 or greater
  • Teams Android version: 2022372201 or greater.

Users must be using the latest headset firmware version and recommended MS Teams version to avoid bluetooth connectivity problems with the headset.

Rugged Android phones

  • Crosscall Core-X4, Core-M5, Action-X5, Core-X5, and Core-T5

    • Manual setup: With Teams installed, go to Settings > Buttons. On the Dedicated button (1 or 2), select Long press, and then choose PTT App. Select the blue wheel next to Custom, and select Teams.

  • Kyocera DuraForce Ultra 5G and DuraSport 5G

    • Manual setup: With Teams installed, go to Settings > Programmable keys. Choose PTT key or Press and hold (depending on the device), and select Teams.

  • Honeywell CT30 XP, CT30 XP HC, EDA51, EDA52, EDA52 HC,

  • Manual setup: With Teams installed, the dedicated PTT button works with Walkie Talkie by default.

    Important

    Customers using Honeywell CT30 should upgrade to Android version: A11 HON4290 MR14.

  • Samsung Galaxy XCover Pro, Galaxy XCover 5, Galaxy Tab Active 3

    • Manual setup: With Teams installed, go to Settings > Advanced Features > XCover/Active key. Turn on Control XCover key with app and select Teams.
    • MDM setup

  • Sonim XP8

    • Manual setup: With Teams installed, go to Settings > Programmable Keys. Choose Select PTT Key app, and select Teams.

  • Zebra TC5x, TC15, TC5301 , TC7x, TC2x, EC5x, EC30, MC3300, MC9300, ET40

    • Manual setup: With Teams installed, the dedicated PTT button (LEFT_TRIGGER_2) works with Walkie Talkie by default.

Note

These devices are not Teams certified. They have been validated to work with Teams Walkie Talkie.

Bluetooth devices

Note

If your users are using Bluetooth accessories, make sure that your mobile device management (MDM) solution doesn't block Bluetooth devices.

On devices running Android OS version 12 or later, Bluetooth permissions are required and location permissions to connect using the BLE stack are no longer required. If "nearby permissions" aren't granted at the Teams level, a user will receive a prompt for Bluetooth permissions. This prompt is displayed, whether or not a Bluetooth accessory, such as a headset, is connected to their device. If a Bluetooth accessory is connected, tapping Allow connects Walkie Talkie to the Bluetooth accessory.

Get insight into Walkie Talkie usage and performance

The Walkie Talkie usage and performance report in the Teams admin center gives you and overview of Walkie Talkie activity and performance in your organization. The report provides information such as the number of PTT transmissions made and received, channel activity, transmission duration, and device and participant details.

More information

  • If users are using mobile data to communicate via Teams, Walkie Talkie will use the same method.
  • Walkie Talkie should work well in low bandwidth situations, or situations where your smartphone is connected and working. Walkie Talkie won't work when there's no connectivity at all.

To learn more about the end-user experience, see:

Give feedback or report an issue

To send feedback, select the Help option at bottom of the Teams left navigation bar, and then select Report a Problem. Select Other, and then enter your feedback or details about the issue you're experiencing. Indicate at the beginning of your feedback report that you're sending feedback about "Walkie Talkie" so we can easily identify Walkie Talkie issues.

Allow users to provide feedback

Users in your organization can attach logs while sharing feedback On Microsoft, if you enable the policy to Set whether users can send feedback about Teams to Microsoft.