Workplace presence, made effortless: Workplace check-in via Wi-Fi for Microsoft Places and Teams

We’re introducing workplace check-in via Wi-Fi for Microsoft Places and Teams, designed to help employees coordinate in-person work by keeping their workplace location up to date when they’re in the office. This capability builds on existing Microsoft 365 presence signals like calendar availability and Teams presence by making workplace location easier to keep current. For employees who choose to enable it, workplace check-in via Wi-Fi can update their workplace location based on connection to configured company networks, reducing the need to manually change status. This experience is similar to the existing workplace check-in via peripherals, where a user can keep their workplace location updated by plugging into a configured peripheral like a display or a desk dock. Organizations enable and configure this feature in their tenant, and individual users control whether and how it is used.

When an employee is in the office and connects their laptop to a configured corporate network, workplace check-in can update their work location for the day, only when enabled by the organization and the individual user. This reduces the need to manually update location while keeping employees in control.

Workplace check-in via Wi-Fi is a new way to help people understand one another’s availability. “Free” or “busy” on a calendar lets you find a time. Presence in Teams shows when someone is active. Workplace presence in Places, Teams, and calendar helps team members identify who is currently in the office, so you can grab lunch or coffee, book a desk near your team, or move a meeting to in person.

Workplace check-in helps keep the employee’s workplan up to date and includes the ability to check the employee into an existing desk reservation. When schedules shift or someone decides to come into the office, employees who choose to use it can have their work location updated without needing to manually adjust their status each time.

 A few important details about how this works:

• Employees remain in control. Workplace check-in via Wi‑Fi does not replace a user’s choice to share their workplace location, and individuals can configure their setting at any time.
• It does not retain or track information about employee movement or location over time. Workplace location is a current, in-the-moment signal and is not stored as historical data.
• It applies only to workplace contexts. The signal is generated when a device connects to configured corporate office networks through the Teams client and does not extend beyond those environments. Otherwise, if not connected to a configured network in a workplace location, your location will be shown as “Remote”.

Built on a layered model of consent and control

Workplace check-in is designed with both organizational controls and individual choice in mind.

Organizations first decide whether to enable the capability for their tenant, and then configure whether the end-user experience is opt-in or opt-out. They also configure which office locations the feature is available in by adding device information from each of the Wi-Fi access points in the chosen locations.

Individuals remain in control of whether the feature works on their device. If required location settings are turned off, workplace check-in via Wi-Fi will not automatically activate regardless of organizational configuration. Employees can also update their settings and manually set or override their work location at any time.

Sharing workplace presence and using workplace check-in are separate decisions, so employees can choose whether their workplace presence is visible to others when working from the office.

Get started

Wi-Fi check-in for Microsoft Places will roll out to organizations with Microsoft Places later this year. To prepare your tenant:

1. Confirm Microsoft Places is set up in your environment, specifically adding building information in the Places directory.
2. Enable the Teams work location detection policy and configure your approved corporate BSSID within the Places directory
3. Communicate the change to your employees: what it does, what it doesn’t do, and how they can can control their own settings.

To learn more about Microsoft Places and the broader workplace presence experience, visit our adoption site.