Microsoft is currently in the process of distributing a new Teams version for macOS that will finally run natively on Apple Silicon machines – almost two years after those Macs first hit the market. The Windows and Office group had originally announced that it would make the “switch” to the M1 or M2 architecture by September. Previously, Teams only ran in Rosetta emulation mode in the old Intel version on the new machines.
Sometimes unexpected comes
As a look at the macOS activity monitor shows, version 1.5.00.20352, which was distributed in the last few days and is no longer a beta, now has the architecture specification “Apple” for the first time. Why Microsoft is proceeding faster here than originally planned was not initially communicated. According to the roadmap last week, it was said that teams would be given several more months to adapt to Apple Silicon.
All core processes of Teams are now native. This affects the main program, but also the auxiliary applications including renderer and GPU processes. Only one area has remained stuck in the Intel world so far: A proprietary core audio driver that Microsoft installs for teams – apparently as part of its voice and video chat function. The driver activated via launchd named MSTeamsAudioDevice.driver still does not run natively on Apple Silicon. It remains to be seen what concrete effects this will have and whether this process will also result in another switch from the Intel world. Microsoft may have until September to do this. The teams update cannot be triggered automatically, it automatically ends up on the computer. Alternatively, you can download the client again.
Teams was really annoying on M1 and M2 Macs
For many months, users had criticized teams on the actually very fast M1 and M2 machines, some of them massively. This affected both the start of the app, which could take 20 to 30 seconds, and regular operation, such as switching between chats and teams. On some Macs, the application could also slow down the entire system, which in some cases led to the recommendation to abandon the native client altogether and prefer to work in a browser.
Microsoft adapted its Office products to Apple Silicon relatively quickly, but it took much longer for teams. The current Teams version works as an Electron app. However, that does not have to be the reason, since the framework for Apple Silicon has long been available. The new team version is now much faster to use, both for the start and for simple things like changing windows. However, one feature is still missing: the ability to store more than one business account. This is still only possible in the mobile version of the application – which is extremely annoying for companies or sole proprietors with multiple customers who use Teams.
