When to Use @channel, @here and Team Mentions in Slack and Teams

A group mention is the loudest thing you can do in a chat app. It buzzes phones and pulls people out of their work. Sometimes that is exactly right. Most of the time it is not. This guide explains what each mention does in Slack and Teams according to their help pages, how to choose the smallest one that works, and a message pattern that respects the people you are pinging.

Miles Crawford

5 min read

A speech bubble at the center of three widening rings of people avatars, with a megaphone and a slider at the corner for choosing how wide the message reaches — This image was generated with AI

What each Slack mention does

Slack's help describes three group mentions:

@everyone notifies every person in the general channel, which all members except guests are added to automatically. It notifies people whether their availability is active or away.
@channel notifies all members of a channel, whether their availability is active or away.
@here notifies only the active members of a channel. Slack says this suits cases where you do not want to notify coworkers who are not available at the time.

Slack also lists some limits. These mentions do not notify people whose notifications are paused, and they do not notify people when they are used in threads. In channels with at least six members, Slack asks you to confirm before sending a message that has one, and owners and admins can turn that warning off. Owners and admins with permission can also restrict who may use them. If you do not see the option, ask an owner for help. Slack says it suggests using these mentions sparingly.

If you need a specific person, mention them directly. On the Pro, Business+ and Enterprise plans, Slack also lets you notify a particular group of people by creating a user group.

What group mentions do in Teams

In a channel conversation or a chat, you @mention a person by typing @ before their name and choosing them from the menu. Microsoft says the person's notification takes them straight to the place in the conversation where they were mentioned.

For a whole group, Microsoft lists a mention that notifies everyone on the team and one that notifies everyone in the channel. In a chat rather than a channel, you can notify everyone in the chat by typing @everyone. Microsoft's page notes that a team owner must first enable these features, so if the option is missing, that is the first thing to check.

We have not found Microsoft documentation that matches Slack's active-only @here, so we do not describe an equivalent for Teams. If your team needs "only people who are online right now", ask in the channel instead, or pick the people yourself.

Pick the smallest group that needs to know

This is our suggested order, from quietest to loudest:

No mention. Post in the channel. People who follow it will see it.
One person. If one person has to act, mention that person and say what you need.
A group you control. A Slack user group, or a short list of names, when a specific set of people is involved.
@here. In Slack, when you need an answer from whoever is around right now.
@channel or the team or channel mention in Teams. Only when everyone in the channel needs this, and it cannot wait.
@everyone. Rarely. Slack's own examples are a new vacation policy or an evacuation drill.

Slack's examples for @channel are a last-minute change to a project deadline or a change to a work process or the channel structure. Those are good tests: it is timely, it affects everyone in the channel, and people would want to know today.

A message pattern for a group mention

Make the first line say why you are pinging, so people can decide in a second whether it applies to them. This layout is our suggestion:

The mention and the reason. "@here Quick question for anyone on the release today."
What you need or what changed. One or two sentences.
By when. A time and a time zone, or "no reply needed".

Put an emoji at the start of the line if it helps people scan, for example 📣 for an announcement or ❓ for a question, and keep the words next to it. Our accessibility guide explains why a bare emoji is easy to miss. When the question is answered, say so in a reply or a reaction, so people know they can stop watching.

When a mention is the wrong tool

Real emergencies. Slack says these mentions do not notify people whose notifications are paused. A mention is not a safety system. Use your company's emergency process, such as a phone call or an on-call tool.
Non-urgent news. If it can wait for the next time people open the channel, do not mention anyone. Consider scheduling the message for working hours instead.
Singling someone out. A group mention that names a problem a person caused puts them on display. Raise it with them directly.
Replies in threads in Slack. Slack says these mentions do not notify anyone in threads, so a group mention there will not do what you expect. Post in the channel if it needs to reach everyone.
Large or mixed audiences. Before you mention a big channel, check who is in it, including guests and people from other companies in shared channels.

Your workplace may have its own rules about who can mention whom and when. Those rules come first.

Sources

Checked October 15, 2026. The descriptions of each mention and the limits follow each product's own help articles. The order of choices and the message pattern are our suggestions.