Vercel Chat SDK Adds Reactions and Private Messages to Teams
Quick Reads
- Vercel’s Chat SDK now supports reactions and ephemeral messages on Microsoft Teams.
- Bots can add or remove emoji reactions on Teams messages through the same unified API.
- Ephemeral messages are visible only to the intended user, perfect for permission prompts.
- The update also brings author emails, custom token authentication, and smarter conversation routing.
- Developers can start with the Teams adapter documentation.
Vercel has updated its Chat SDK Teams adapter with two highly requested features: reactions and ephemeral messages. Both now work through the same unified API available across other adapters, making Microsoft Teams a first-class citizen in the Chat SDK ecosystem.
Bots can now add or remove emoji reactions on Teams messages programmatically. Developers can also call thread.postEphemeral() or channel.postEphemeral() to send targeted messages. Only the intended recipient sees these messages. This makes the feature ideal for permission prompts or quiet status updates that would otherwise clutter a shared channel.
More Control Over Bot Behaviour
The release also ships several quality-of-life improvements. Incoming Teams messages now carry the author’s Microsoft Graph email, with the user principal name as a fallback. Developers can pass a custom token function inside TeamsAdapterConfig. This means bots running outside Azure IMDS environments no longer need a static client secret to authenticate. Progress messages now display as a native Teams status inside direct messages, giving users cleaner feedback during operations.
The update also resolves a long-standing routing problem. Group conversations were previously misidentified as direct messages. That mishandling is now fixed. Furthermore, email addresses, @handles inside URLs, and mentions within code spans no longer convert into unintended Teams mentions, a critical fix for bots that process technical content.
Contributor onmax earned special recognition for their work on this release. Developers can explore the full Teams adapter documentation, or read dedicated guides on ephemeral messages and reactions to get started.
The Chat SDK Teams integration is steadily closing the gap with other major adapters, making it a stronger option for teams building production bots on Microsoft Teams infrastructure.
