If you have been working with Microsoft 365 for a while, you have probably noticed that Microsoft occasionally simplifies product names to better reflect what a service actually does.
The latest example is Viva Connections.
Microsoft has announced a series of updates to SharePoint home sites, including a rebranding of the Viva Connections app in Teams. Going forward, it will simply be known as the SharePoint app in Teams.
One of the challenges I have encountered when discussing Viva Connections with customers is that many users never fully understood what it was. SharePoint, on the other hand, is already a well-established concept in most organizations. By aligning the experience more closely with SharePoint, Microsoft may actually make it easier for both administrators and end users to understand what they are working with. And to be honest. It has always been SharePoint, but was pushed as Viva Connections when Microsoft launched the Viva concept.
Perhaps the most interesting addition is the expanded customization experience for the SharePoint app in Teams. Organizations will gain more flexibility when tailoring how the intranet experience appears across both desktop and mobile devices. As more employees spend the majority of their day inside Teams rather than a web browser, the ability to deliver a well-designed intranet experience within Teams becomes increasingly important.
