Viva Connections
Viva Connections is the Microsoft 365 intranet experience delivered inside Microsoft Teams. It has three components: a dashboard of interactive cards for everyday tasks, a personalised feed of news and conversations, and a resources list of curated links. It is powered by a SharePoint home site, which supplies the branding, navigation and content, so what employees see in Teams is the organisation’s SharePoint intranet in a Teams-shaped wrapper. During 2026 Microsoft renamed the Teams app to the SharePoint app.
Part of the SharePoint reference · Licensing and rename details verified against Microsoft documentation · Last reviewed 1 September 2026
It is now called the SharePoint app in Teams. Microsoft renamed Viva Connections during 2026 — targeted release from early May, all production tenants by the end of June. Nothing about the underlying technology changed, but the licensing did, and in your favour. What actually changed.
The 2026 rename, and what it changed
A lot of guidance published before mid-2026 — including pages currently ranking for this term — still describes the old arrangement. Here is the current position.
- The name. The Teams app previously called Viva Connections is now the SharePoint app. Rollout began with targeted release tenants in early May 2026 and reached all production tenants by the end of June 2026.
- Nothing broke. Existing dashboards, web parts, audience targeting and configurations continue to work exactly as before. The underlying home site technology is unchanged.
- Custom branding survived. Tenants that had already set their own display name and icon keep them. The rename applied only to tenants using the default name and icon.
- Licensing loosened. Core intranet features — home sites and the Resources and Announcements web parts — are now available with standard Microsoft 365 commercial plans. A dedicated Viva employee experience licence is no longer required to deploy a working intranet in Teams.
- Administration moved. A communication site can now be designated as the home site directly in the SharePoint admin center, rather than through the Viva Connections management console in the Microsoft 365 admin center.
Worth a look before you next brief anyone. If your internal documentation, training decks or intranet help pages refer to “Viva Connections”, employees will now see something called SharePoint instead. It is a small mismatch that generates a surprising number of support tickets.
The three components
Whatever it is called, the experience is made of the same three parts, and they are configured separately.
- DashboardA curated set of cards for tasks and tools — approvals, assigned tasks, shifts, links and custom line-of-business actions. Each card can be sized and audience-targeted. The dashboard page can only be created on the site designated as the home site.
- FeedNews from SharePoint sites blended with Viva Engage conversations, ranked per person. Employees only see content they already have permission to see.
- ResourcesA list of navigational links and icons, drawn from the home site's global navigation. This is the part that most obviously depends on having a home site in place.
Connections and Engage are not the same thing
This pair gets confused more than any other in the Viva family, partly because both are described as employee experience tools.
| Viva Connections | Viva Engage | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | The intranet, inside Teams | The enterprise social network |
| Powered by | A SharePoint home site | Microsoft 365 groups and communities |
| Content is | Published — news, links, tasks | Conversational — posts, questions, praise |
| Who creates it | Comms and IT, centrally | Anyone in the organisation |
| Relationship | The container | One kind of content inside it |
How Viva Connections fits into Microsoft 365
- SharePointThe engine. A designated home site supplies branding, global navigation and the pages the experience surfaces. Connections is a delivery mechanism for a SharePoint intranet, not a separate intranet.
- Microsoft TeamsThe container. Reach depends entirely on Teams being the daily habit, which for most organisations it now is.
- Viva EngageSupplies conversation into the feed alongside SharePoint news, so the destination carries both published content and discussion.
- SPFxDashboard cards are Adaptive Card Extensions built with the SharePoint Framework. Anything beyond the built-in cards and the no-code designer is a development project.
- Global navThe home site's global navigation populates the resources section, which is why navigation design and Connections design are the same job.
Licensing and limits
| Hard limits — enforced by the service | |
| Experiences included with M365 E, F or A | 1 |
|---|---|
| Maximum experiences per tenant | 50 |
| Dashboard page can be created on | The home site only |
| Components per experience | 3 — dashboard, feed, resources |
| Admin permission required | SharePoint admin or higher |
| Licensing and configuration | |
| Two or more experiences require | Viva Suite or Comms & Communities |
| Premium licence needed for all tenant users? | Yes, for multi-experience |
| Home site, Resources & Announcements web parts | Standard M365 plans |
| Custom card technology | SPFx Adaptive Card Extensions |
| Audience targeting on cards and links | Yes |
| Renamed — targeted release | Early May 2026 |
| Renamed — all production tenants | End of June 2026 |
Sources: Microsoft Learn, Home site updates (May 2026); Microsoft Learn, Set up Viva Connections in the Microsoft 365 admin center; Microsoft Learn, Available dashboard cards in Viva Connections. Verified 1 September 2026. Some older Microsoft localised pages still quote a limit of ten experiences; the current English documentation states 50. See the full SharePoint limits table for platform-wide figures.
Rollout notes
- Multi-experience licensing is all-or-nothing. Running two or more experiences requires the premium licence for every user in the tenant, not just those using the extra ones. That usually settles the question in favour of one experience with well-targeted cards.
- Each experience is maintained separately. Overlapping content across regional or subsidiary experiences means duplicated editorial work every time something changes.
- A standalone experience is fast but generic. You can create one without an existing intranet portal, which gets you running in minutes and produces a destination that looks like nobody’s company.
- Card sprawl is the usual failure. Dashboards decay when nobody retires cards. Agree up front who owns the dashboard and how a card earns its place.
Key takeaways
- Jun 26 renamed It is called the SharePoint app in Teams now Rollout finished across production tenants by end of June 2026. The technology is unchanged, and tenants with custom branding kept it.
- $0 core intranet You no longer need a Viva licence for a working intranet Home sites and the Resources and Announcements web parts now come with standard Microsoft 365 commercial plans. This is the change most published guidance has not caught up with.
- 1 → 50 experiences One experience is included; the tenant cap is 50 Going beyond one requires a premium licence for every user in the tenant, not just those using the extras. That usually settles it in favour of one well-targeted experience.
- Home site required The dashboard can only be built on the home site Branding, the landing experience and the resources list all come from it. A standalone experience is quick to stand up and looks like nobody's company.
- SPFx for cards Custom cards are a development project Beyond the built-in cards and the no-code designer, dashboard cards are Adaptive Card Extensions requiring a build pipeline and ongoing maintenance.
- 3 components Dashboard, feed and resources are configured separately They are three distinct pieces of work, not one setup task, and each has its own owner and decay pattern.
Everything depends on the home site
This is the part worth dwelling on, because it determines whether the whole thing works. Viva Connections does not contain any content of its own. It surfaces a SharePoint home site: the branding, the navigation, the news, the pages. If the home site is a default communication site with three stacked web parts, that is precisely what employees will find when they open the app in Teams.
Organisations frequently invest in the Connections rollout — the licences, the admin configuration, the Teams pinning, the launch comms — and then point it at an intranet nobody wanted to visit in the first place. Delivering an unloved intranet into Teams makes it more visible, not more useful, and the adoption numbers show it within a month.
The app is only as good as the home site behind it
ShortPoint is a no-code design layer for SharePoint. It builds the home site that Connections surfaces — so what lands in Teams is a properly designed intranet rather than a default page with your logo on it. Nothing about your Connections configuration changes.
- Branded home site with your fonts, colours and layout — no SPFx development
- Designed news, events, links and directories in place of stacked default web parts
- Audience-targeted sections so frontline and head office get different content
- Mobile-ready, which is where most Connections traffic actually comes from
- Maintained by your comms team, not by a developer queue
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Common questions about Viva Connections
What is Viva Connections?
Viva Connections is the Microsoft 365 intranet experience delivered inside Microsoft Teams. It has three components: a dashboard of interactive cards for everyday tasks, a personalised feed of news and conversations, and a resources list of curated links. It is powered by a SharePoint home site, which supplies the branding, navigation and content, so what employees see in Teams is the organisation’s SharePoint intranet in a Teams-shaped wrapper. During 2026 Microsoft renamed the Teams app to the SharePoint app.
What is the new name for Viva Connections?
It is now called the SharePoint app in Microsoft Teams. Microsoft began the rename with targeted release tenants in early May 2026 and completed the rollout to production tenants by the end of June 2026. The underlying technology did not change: existing dashboards, web parts, audience targeting and configurations continue to work exactly as before. Tenants that had already set a custom display name and icon keep their own branding, because the rename applied only to the default name and icon.
What are Viva Connections used for?
It is used to bring the intranet to people who live in Microsoft Teams rather than in a browser, which in most organisations is nearly everyone. Typical uses are giving frontline and deskless staff mobile access to shifts, safety checklists and policies; surfacing company news where people already are; and putting common tasks such as approvals, time-off requests and IT tickets one tap away as dashboard cards. It exists because intranets are under-used when they require a separate destination.
How much does Viva Connections cost?
One experience is included with Microsoft 365 plans that carry SharePoint Online, at no extra cost. Following the 2026 changes, core intranet features including home sites and the Resources and Announcements web parts are available with standard Microsoft 365 commercial plans, so a dedicated Viva licence is no longer needed to run a functional intranet in Teams. Creating two or more experiences, up to a tenant maximum of 50, requires a Microsoft Viva Suite or Viva Communications and Communities licence for every user.
Is Viva Connections the same as Viva Engage?
No, they do different jobs and are commonly confused. Viva Connections is the intranet delivered inside Teams — news, links, resources and task cards, powered by a SharePoint home site. Viva Engage is the enterprise social network, formerly Yammer, where people post in communities and follow leaders. They work together: Connections provides the destination and Engage supplies conversation inside the feed. Connections is the container; Engage is one kind of content in it.
Do you need a SharePoint home site for Viva Connections?
For a full experience, effectively yes. The home site supplies the branding, the landing experience, and the global navigation that populates the resources section, and the dashboard page can only be created on the site designated as the home site. You can create a standalone experience without an existing intranet portal, which is the fastest way to start, but it produces a generic destination. Since 2026 a communication site can be designated as home site directly in the SharePoint admin center.
What are Viva Connections dashboard cards?
Cards are the interactive tiles that make up the dashboard, and they are built on Adaptive Card Extensions in the SharePoint Framework. Microsoft supplies built-in cards for approvals, assigned tasks, shifts, news and links; a no-code card designer covers simple custom quick views; and developers can build fully bespoke cards with SPFx for line-of-business systems. Every card can be sized and audience-targeted, so a frontline worker and a head office manager see different dashboards.
How many Viva Connections experiences can you have?
A tenant is limited to a maximum of 50 experiences overall. One is included with a standard Microsoft 365 E, F or A licence. Creating two or more requires a Microsoft Viva Suite or Viva Communications and Communities licence for every user in the tenant, not just for the people using the extra experiences. Multiple experiences suit distinct audiences such as separate regions, subsidiaries or frontline populations, but each one has to be maintained separately.
Sources
- Microsoft Learn — Home site updates (rename to SharePoint app)
- Microsoft Learn — Set up Viva Connections in the Microsoft 365 admin center
- Microsoft Learn — Available dashboard cards in Viva Connections
- Microsoft Learn — Overview: Viva Connections