Create a Channel in Slack and Teams (and Pick the Right Type)

Creating a channel in Slack

On desktop, click the plus sign in the sidebar and select Channel. On a paid plan you can start with a blank channel or pick a template that sets the channel up for a purpose like managing a project or handling approvals. Enter a name, choose public or private, and click Create. On mobile, tap the plus sign from the Home tab, enter a name, choose the channel type and tap Create.

Who is allowed to do this depends on your workspace. By default, members can create channels and multi-channel guests can create private channels, but workspace owners can change both permissions. If the option is missing for you, a workspace owner is the person to ask.

Creating a channel in Teams

There are two ways in. You can select New items at the top of your chats and channels list and choose New channel, then pick the team that will host it. Or you can find the team under See all your teams, select More options next to its name and choose Add channel. Either way you give the channel a name, an optional description and a channel type.

Team owners and admins decide who can create channels. If you own a team and want to change that, select More options next to the team name, go to Settings, then Member permissions, and choose whether members can create, update or delete channels.

Standard, private or shared in Teams

Teams asks you to pick a channel type up front, and the choice is permanent, so it is worth a pause:

• Standard channels are open to everyone on the team, and anything posted is searchable by other members. A team can have up to 1,000 channels over its life, counting ones that are later deleted.
• Private channels are for a smaller audience inside the team. You join by invitation, a team can have up to 30, and each can have up to 250 members with more than one owner.
• Shared channels reach people outside the team or even outside your organization. Only team owners can create them, external guests need your admin to have enabled B2B direct connect, and shared channels can only be created from the desktop or web app, not mobile.

You cannot convert one type into another later, and a shared channel cannot move to a different host team. When in doubt, standard is the forgiving default.

Names that stay useful

These are our suggestions rather than rules from either tool, but they age well. Keep names short and predictable, and agree on simple prefixes like proj- or help- so related channels sort together. Skip inside jokes for anything that needs to last longer than a month, and write one line in the channel's description or first post saying what belongs there. Future you, searching for the channel, will be grateful.

What to be careful about

• Channel types are permanent in Teams. Standard, private and shared cannot be converted into each other after creation.
• Deleting is only partly reversible. A deleted Teams channel can be restored within 30 days, but during that window you cannot create a new channel with the same name, and deleting loses the conversation history if you let it lapse.
• SharePoint comes along for the ride. Creating a team or a private or shared channel automatically creates a connected SharePoint site for its files.
• Permissions vary. In both tools, owners and admins can restrict who creates channels, so a missing option is a policy, not a bug.

Sources

Checked October 17, 2026. The steps, types and limits follow each product's own help articles. The naming advice is ours.

• Slack: Create a channel
• Microsoft: Create a standard, private, or shared channel in Teams
• Microsoft: Standard, private, or shared channels in Teams