Telephone handsets for Teams - a summary
If you're looking at moving to Microsoft Teams, or you're currently using Skype for Business Online for telephony but are thinking about the inevitable move to Teams, you may be wondering about what your options for handsets are. The situation is evolving all the time, but I've tried to summarise the current (August 2019) situation here.
Of course, the question as to why anyone needs a handset - rather than using a headset with their PC - to use Teams or Skype for Business is a question in itself, but personal preference does mean that there is some requirement in most organisations. And of course, not everyone in a business uses a computer, so most environments have at least a few non-personal common-area phones (and sometimes more than a few - I've worked on projects with hundreds of common-area phones).
For me though, there's a huge gap in that there isn't a simple, cheap, really basic phone (like the good old Polycom VVX 201). If you only need a handful of phones, that's not a big issue - but if you need hundreds of phones for your business (think production areas, laboratories, kitchens, retail shop-floors), the current Teams phones are overkill and very expensive indeed. In fact, I can see the potential for Teams to be completely out-priced as a phone replacement solution for this reason alone, for some use cases.
All of the Teams phones run exactly the same Android software from Microsoft - this is Microsoft's approach to working in the new cloud-first world, as it means they can ensure that the phone firmware keeps up with the Teams service. There's a useful overview of the phones' features and user interface here.
There are however some limitations and issues with the current software (the biggest and most surprising limitation being that you can't actually have a list of contacts), Matt Landis has summarised these in a recent blog. No doubt a 'Version 2' will be coming soon (my guess is that it will be launched at Ignite).
If you have any old Lync Phone Edition handsets somehow connected to your Skype on-premises environment (Polycom CX series) these will not work with Teams.
If you're in the situation of needing to buy phones for use on Skype for Business now, but moving to Teams shortly, your options include buying into the Poly trade-up program noted above, alternatively, Yealink/Crestron or AudioCodes have handsets which will run Skype for Business, but which can be upgraded to run the native Teams software.
If however you have your Trios connected to video cameras, this is not a supported configuration for Teams natively, but it will work via the Polycom RealConnect gateway (also explained in Jeff's article).
Of course, the question as to why anyone needs a handset - rather than using a headset with their PC - to use Teams or Skype for Business is a question in itself, but personal preference does mean that there is some requirement in most organisations. And of course, not everyone in a business uses a computer, so most environments have at least a few non-personal common-area phones (and sometimes more than a few - I've worked on projects with hundreds of common-area phones).
If you need phones for Teams now
Today, your choices are to buy phones from Audiocodes, Yealink or Crestron (the Crestron phones are actually by Yealink). There's a full list on the Microsoft partner web site. Poly are due to release their Teams phones around the end of this year, but they have a trade-up program which would let you buy a VVX phone now and return it for a Teams phone when they ship.
For me though, there's a huge gap in that there isn't a simple, cheap, really basic phone (like the good old Polycom VVX 201). If you only need a handful of phones, that's not a big issue - but if you need hundreds of phones for your business (think production areas, laboratories, kitchens, retail shop-floors), the current Teams phones are overkill and very expensive indeed. In fact, I can see the potential for Teams to be completely out-priced as a phone replacement solution for this reason alone, for some use cases.
All of the Teams phones run exactly the same Android software from Microsoft - this is Microsoft's approach to working in the new cloud-first world, as it means they can ensure that the phone firmware keeps up with the Teams service. There's a useful overview of the phones' features and user interface here.
There are however some limitations and issues with the current software (the biggest and most surprising limitation being that you can't actually have a list of contacts), Matt Landis has summarised these in a recent blog. No doubt a 'Version 2' will be coming soon (my guess is that it will be launched at Ignite).
If you are using Skype for Business now (and moving to Teams in the future)
There is, as they say, good news and bad news. The good news is that existing phones which work with Skype for Business Online - your Polycom VVX series, for example - will work with Teams - at least, they will until July 31st, 2023. The bad news is that there are various limitations (the most fundamental one being that they can't answer calls from a Call Queue) - you really just get the basic telephone functionality.If you have any old Lync Phone Edition handsets somehow connected to your Skype on-premises environment (Polycom CX series) these will not work with Teams.
If you're in the situation of needing to buy phones for use on Skype for Business now, but moving to Teams shortly, your options include buying into the Poly trade-up program noted above, alternatively, Yealink/Crestron or AudioCodes have handsets which will run Skype for Business, but which can be upgraded to run the native Teams software.
If you have Polycom Trio conference room phones...
...the good news is that you can now upgrade them to run the native Teams software if you want to run them as an audio-only conferencing phone, there's a great article on that by Jeff Schertz here. The Trio is now certified for Teams by Microsoft using this new firmware, but only in 'Shared mode' (i.e. the mode you'd want to use it for a meeting room), not for 'Personal mode' (where you have a user account signed in). This is because Personal mode uses more CPU, and the processor in the Trio can't quite keep up. So this could be an issue for some Trio's used on an executive's desk.If however you have your Trios connected to video cameras, this is not a supported configuration for Teams natively, but it will work via the Polycom RealConnect gateway (also explained in Jeff's article).
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