Somewhere for every conversation, including the long ones.
Channels, private rooms, group and one-to-one messages, and a room per office. Threads keep a reply from derailing the room. And when a thread turns into something the team will come back to for months, it becomes a topic instead of scrolling away.
Where a conversation can live
- A channelOpen, or private to the people in it
- A direct messageOne to one, or a small group
- A hub roomEveryone in one office, without a channel to create
- A topicFor the conversation that runs for months
The shapes
Four ways a conversation is held.
Three of them you already know. The fourth is the one Slack does not have.
Channels, groups and a room per office.
Open channels for anyone, private ones for the people in them, direct messages one to one or in a small group, and a room for each office that exists without anybody creating it.
Kinds of room
- ChannelOpen to the company, or private to its members
- DirectOne to one, or a handful of people
- Hub roomEveryone in that office, automatically
Reply without derailing the room.
Answer in a thread and the channel stays readable. Only the people in that thread get pulled back in, and the same threads are there on your phone.
Threads
- On web and mobileThe same conversation on both
- Only who is in itThe room is not notified for every reply
- Findable laterSearched with everything else
When a thread deserves to outlive itself.
Some conversations run for months: a migration, a launch, a difficult account. Promote one message and it becomes a topic - a durable place inside the room that people can follow, rather than a thread that scrolls away.
Slack has nothing like this. It is the difference between a conversation you can find again and one you have to remember the date of.
A topic
- Made from a messagePromote the one where it started
- Followed on purposePeople subscribe, rather than being pulled in
- Stays putInside the room, not scrolling out of it
Say it however it needs saying.
Rich text and code blocks, reactions, edits, voice notes with dictation, files from your computer or from Drive and OneDrive, andscheduled messages so a 6am thought does not become a 6am notification.
And translation inline, in the message, at no extra cost. Teams charges for that one.
In a message
- Rich text and codeFormatted properly, not as a screenshot
- Voice notesRecorded, and written out if you want it read
- FilesFrom your machine, Drive or OneDrive
- Scheduled, starred, pinnedSend later, keep, or hold at the top
- TranslatedInline, included, in a team that spans languages
Search that covers more than the chat.
Search from anywhere with a keystroke, with the matches highlighted and pills to narrow it to a room or a person. Because chat sits in the same place as the work, what you find is not only what somebody typed.
Finding a conversation
- One keystrokeFrom wherever you are in the app
- HighlightedThe match shown in the message, not just the message
- NarrowedTo a room, a person, or a date