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Microsoft 365 Groups

Make Microsoft 365 Groups (not) Visible in Outlook Client

What are Microsoft 365 Groups?

Groups in Microsoft 365 let you choose a set of people that you wish to collaborate with and easily set up a collection of resources for those people to share. Resources such as a shared Outlook inbox, shared calendar or a document library for collaborating on files. Original source: Doc from Microsoft

How to Create a M365 Group?

Microsoft provides several ways to create a M365 group, either in outlook, teams, SharePoint and more. Detailed instructions from Microsoft.

Different ways to create M365 group, may result in group not visible in Outlook

The Microsoft developers’ original purpose, I believe, is to provide different experience on different types of groups, just like it said in doc:

  • If your team prefers to collaborate via email and needs a shared calendar: Create a Microsoft 365 Group in Outlook.
  • If your team wants to collaborate in a persistent chat environment or use embedded apps: Create a Microsoft Team.
  • If you want to create a large, open, discussion forum for your company – for example for executive-level announcements and discussions: Create a group in Yammer.

Until one day one of my clients asked me: why I can’t see the group in outlook when I can use it in Teams and SharePoint site, I found out that All new teams have an associated Microsoft 365 group. By default, this Microsoft 365 group is hidden from Exchange clients (Outlook and OWA) and is also hidden from the global address list (GAL). Original source.

For the first time user, you may not be able to execute the code from Microsoft:

Set-UnifiedGroup -Identity "Your Group Name" -HiddenFromAddressListsEnabled $false

Prerequisites to change the group visibility in Outlook

  • PowerShell window you open by selecting Run as administrator
  • PowerShell needs to be configured to run scripts
Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned

answer yes to warnings

  • Verify that Basic authentication is enabled for WinRM, open a Command Prompt
winrm quickconfig

You may get a warning like me, as I installed some virtual TAP, I don't need change firewall settings. You may turn off firewall or change network profile by:

  1. Press Win key and type settings to open it
  2. Select Network and Internet
  3. Select wireless or ethernet which you are connected now
  4. Click Properties and change the profile type to private or domain
  • Verify that Basic authentication is enabled for WinRM
winrm get winrm/config/client/auth

If you don’t see the value Basic = true like this

winrm set winrm/config/client/auth @{Basic="true"}

After all the steps Install Exchange Online PowerShell V2 module (abbreviated as the EXO V2 module)

Install-Module -Name ExchangeOnlineManagement
Connect-ExchangeOnline -UserPrincipalName "Your M365 email address"

The final step: set M365 groups visible in Outlook

First we check the status

Get-UnifiedGroup -Identity "Quality Team" | fl HiddenFromExchangeClientsEnabled, HiddenFromAddressListsEnabled, AlwaysSubscribeMembersToCalendarEvents

We can find that the group “Quality Team” is hidden in Outlook. Then we turn it visible by

Set-UnifiedGroup -Identity "Quality Team" -HiddenFromExchangeClientsEnabled:$false

After several minutes I can visit the group in Outlook.

Tested on Windows 11, Microsoft 365.

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