Meeting Chat in Slack and Teams: Huddle Threads vs Persistent Meeting Chat
Half the value of a quick call is the links, notes and files dropped while you talk. Slack and Teams both give calls a written side channel, but they build it differently. Slack attaches a dedicated thread to every huddle, living in the conversation where the huddle started. Teams gives each meeting a standalone chat that opens before anyone joins and stays in your chat list afterward, with its own access rules. Here is what each help page documents.
Miles Crawford
The quick version
In a Slack huddle, click the arrow or thread icon in the huddle window to show the dedicated thread for notes, links and files; click the gear icon and select Add topic to set the heading that shows in the conversation. In Teams, select Chat in the meeting controls during a call, right-click the event in Calendar and select Chat with participants to start early, and find the meeting chat in your chat list afterward under the Meeting chats filter.
Slack: every huddle gets a thread
Slack's huddles documentation describes a dedicated message thread for sharing notes, links and files during the discussion. When you are in a huddle, click the arrow icon or the thread icon in the huddle window to show or hide the thread associated with the huddle. To update the heading that will display along with your thread in the conversation, click the gear icon and select Add topic. On mobile, tap the thread icon to show the thread.
Slack: the thread follows the conversation
Because a huddle starts in a channel or DM, its thread belongs to that conversation, not to the call itself. That shapes who can read it: Slack notes that people you invite to a huddle who are not members of the channel or DM will not be able to see the messages in the conversation or the huddle thread. The huddle link gets them into the call, but the written record stays with the channel.
Teams: chat before, during and after
Microsoft documents meeting chat across the whole life of the meeting. Before it starts, people invited to the meeting can chat with each other: select Calendar in Teams, right-click the meeting, and select Chat with participants; messages sent before a meeting are visible to everyone during and after it. During the meeting, select Chat in the meeting controls to open the Meeting chat pane, where you can see who is typing in real time and pop the chat out into a new window to multitask. After the meeting, select Chat in Teams and look for the meeting chat, which carries the same title as the meeting and a calendar icon; the Meeting chats filter at the top of the chat list shows them all in one place.
Teams: who keeps access afterward
Post-meeting chat access is rule-based, per Microsoft. Attendees of scheduled single-instance meetings, and attendees of recurring meetings who are on the meeting invitation, keep chat access after the meeting. Access does not extend to external or anonymous attendees not managed by an org, attendees who were forwarded the meeting, attendees who were nudged to join, or anyone removed from the chat or who left it. If you share an invite from the People pane mid-meeting, the people you invite can see the chat from the time you invited them until the meeting ends. Microsoft also notes that only those with meeting chat access when a recording is saved get automatic access to the recording.
Teams: capacity and access types
Microsoft distinguishes temporary access, which runs from when an attendee joins until the meeting ends, from permanent access, which continues after the meeting until they leave the chat. Capacity depends on timing: Microsoft's table lists 750 people before a meeting and 1,000 during it for both single meetings and series, then 1,000 after a single-instance meeting and 750 after a series instance. The exact access type also varies with how someone was invited and their relationship to the org, and Microsoft notes that adding an external person directly to a meeting chat prompts the creation of a new group chat instead.
Teams: working in the chat
Day-to-day chat mechanics carry over into meeting chat. You can hover a message you sent and select Edit to fix it after sending, hover any message to add a quick reaction, and use the compose box for formatting, files, Loop components and scheduled messages. If chat bubbles in the main meeting window distract you, select More actions, then Settings, then Don't show chat bubbles, or mute an individual bubble to hide it temporarily. Microsoft notes chat access before, during and after a meeting can be limited by organizer settings or IT admin policies.
Which one for what?
Our read: Slack's model is the simpler mental map, because the huddle and its notes both live where the conversation already was. It is ideal when the people talking are exactly the people in the channel. Teams' meeting chat is built for the calendar-driven case: pre-meeting coordination, a paper trail that outlives the call, and a record that follows the meeting rather than a channel. The tradeoff is complexity: Microsoft's access matrix means a forwarded invite or a nudge can leave someone reading nothing afterward, while Slack's boundary is a single, easy-to-explain rule.
What to be careful about
- Slack huddle threads inherit channel privacy. Invited non-members cannot see the conversation or the huddle thread, per Slack.
- Teams pre-meeting messages stick around. Chat sent before the meeting is visible to everyone during and after it.
- Forwarded and nudged Teams attendees lose chat after. So do external or anonymous attendees not managed by an org.
- Recording access follows chat access. Microsoft ties automatic recording access to having meeting chat access when the recording is saved.
- Adding externals directly creates a new group chat in Teams instead of joining the meeting chat.
- Both can be policy-limited. Microsoft notes organizer settings and IT admin policies can restrict chat access around meetings.
Sources
Checked October 26, 2026. Features, steps and limits follow each product's own help articles. The guidance on when each shines is ours.