1. Open Microsoft Teams and navigate to your Chat tab on the left-hand sidebar.
2. Find the conversation you want to keep at the top. This can be an individual chat, a group conversation, or even a meeting chat thread.
3. Hover over the chat name and click the three dots (…) that appear on the right side for More options.
4. Select “Pin” from the drop-down menu.
That’s it! Your selected chat will immediately leap to the top of your chat list under a dedicated Pinned header.
If you ever want to rearrange them, simply drag and drop your pinned chats into whatever order suits your daily routine best. When a project finishes or your priorities shift, just click those same three dots and select Unpin to return the chat to your standard list.
How It Saves You Time (And Keeps You Sane)
If you use Microsoft Teams throughout the day, your chat sidebar is likely a revolving door of updates, quick questions, and notification banners. Without a system, vital conversations quickly get pushed down the list by one-off questions or high-volume channel updates.
Pinning your key chats solves this problem in three major ways:
- Eliminates the Endless Scroll: Instead of typing names into the search bar or scrolling through dozens of recent messages to find your direct team members, your core contacts are permanently parked at the top.
- Reduces Cognitive Load: Constantly searching for where you left off creates minor mental friction. By grouping your daily essentials—like your direct manager, your primary project group, or your work bestie—you create a predictable digital workspace that reduces daily stress.
- Prevents Missed Messages: Important conversations stay front and center, meaning you are far less likely to overlook a critical update from a key stakeholder just because three other messages arrived right after it.
A quick fix like this might only save you 15 to 30 seconds per search, but multiplied across a busy work week, it adds up to hours of saved time and a much calmer workday.
3 Bonus MS Teams Workflow Tips
Once you’ve mastered pinning chats, you can streamline your Teams experience even further with these simple workflow tricks:
1. Pop Out Important Chats: Need to reference a conversation while working in another tab or attending a meeting? Double-click any chat in your list (or click the pop-out icon in the top right corner) to open it in a separate, standalone window.
2. Use the “Save for Later” / Saved Messages Feature: Hover over a specific message, click the three dots, and select Save this message. You can quickly review all your saved items later by clicking your profile icon and selecting Saved, making it an effortless way to build a quick to-do list.
3. Mark Chats as Unread: If you open a message but don’t have time to reply right away, click the three dots on the chat thread and select Mark as unread. It puts the bold notification back on your sidebar so you won’t forget to follow up later.
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