How to Pin a SharePoint Home Page in Microsoft Teams (Step-by step Guide)

In this article, we will demonstrate how to set up quick access to your SharePoint Home Page within Microsoft Teams. For this, we will be using the Viva Connections application. Follow the steps we outline below.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Prerequisite
• Part 1: Enable Viva Connections Experience
  • Step 1: Navigate to Viva Connections in the Microsoft Admin Center
  • Step 2: Add a Connections Experience
  • Step 3: Enable the Connections Experience
  • Step 4: Replace the default landing page of Viva Connections
• Part 2: Add and Pin Viva Connections App to MS Teams
  • Step 1: Open the Microsoft Teams Admin Center
  • Step 2: Navigate to Teams Apps Setup policies
  • Step 3: Update an existing policy or create a new one
  • Step 4: Customize the app name and logo

Prerequisite

• You must have the appropriate admin permissions to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center, specifically permissions for Viva Connections, SharePoint, and Microsoft Teams.

Pinning a SharePoint home page in Microsoft Teams involves two parts:

Part 1: Enable Viva Connections Experience

First, we'll activate Viva Connections and configure it to display a default SharePoint Home site.

Note:
If you already have a Viva Connections Experience set up and your home site is configured as your desired default site, you can skip Steps 1-3 and proceed to Step 4. 

Step 1: Navigate to Viva Connections in the Microsoft Admin Center

• Access Microsoft 365 Admin Center
• Go to Settings and select Viva
• Open Viva Connections

Step 2: Add a Connections Experience

• Click Create and manage your Viva Connections experiences
• Hit Create new
• Select an Experience type
  • If you choose Create a connections experience, you'll need to set a name, which will generate a home page URL. This will generate a new SharePoint site that you can customize later.
  • If you choose Build from an existing portal to set a home site, you'll need to provide the home page URL of your chosen SharePoint site. Note that only Communication sites can be set as a home site.
• Click Create experience button

Step 3: Enable the Connections Experience

• Access the settings of your new Connections experience by clicking its link
• In the General tab, go to Status and hit Edit Status
• Select the Enable experience checkbox and click Save
• In the Audience tab, you can edit who can access the experience by license type, filtering by Azure Active Directory security groups and Microsoft 365 Groups, or both.
• In the Permissions tab, you have the option to configure permissions.

If you have multiple active Viva Connections experiences, make sure to set the designated URL as a home site by clicking the link under "URL" in the General tab.

After completing Steps 1-3, you have successfully set up a home site that appears in the top-right corner of your Viva Connections dashboard. Users can access this home site with a single click. If you wish to keep this setup within MS Teams, you can move on to Part 2.

However, if you want to replace the default Viva Connections experience with your Home Site page, proceed to the next step.

Step 4: Replace the default landing page of Viva Connections

• Search for SharePoint Online Management Shell on your desktop and run it as administrator

If you haven't installed it yet, download the SharePoint Online Management Shell.

• Connect to SharePoint by entering the following command

Connect-SPOService -Url https://yourdomain-admin.sharepoint.com

where yourdomain is the name of your SharePoint site

In our example, our home page URL is https://qv43.sharepoint.com/sites/Oshin and so we will have the command as 

Connect-SPOService -Url https://qv43.sharepoint.com/sites/Oshin-admin.sharepoint.com

• Log in with your admin credentials
• Run the command below to change the Home Site URL

Set-SPOHomeSite -HomeSiteUrl "homesiteURL" -VivaConnectionsDefaultStart $true/$false

where:

homesiteURL is your home page’s URL

use $true to set the default home page to your SharePoint Home Site

use $false to revert the default home page to the Viva Connections dashboard experience

In our example, the command will be

Set-SPOHomeSite -HomeSiteUrl "https://qv43.sharepoint.com/sites/Oshin" -VivaConnectionsDefaultStart $true

Note:
Changes may take between 15 minutes up to 24 hours to take effect. Users might also need to sign out and sign back in to see the new experience.

Great! you have completed the first part of the process. Now, let us make this Viva Connections Experience available in Microsoft Teams.

Part 2: Add and Pin Viva Connections App to MS Teams

Next, we'll pin Viva Connections to the Microsoft Teams App bar, providing users with direct access to the designated SharePoint home site.

Step 1: Open the Microsoft Teams Admin Center

• Go back to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center and select Teams

Step 2: Navigate to Teams Apps Setup policies

• Expand Teams Apps
• Select Setup policies

Step 3: Update an existing policy or create a new one

• You have two options on how to set up Connections in MS Teams
  • If you want to add the app to the default setup for MS Teams across the organization, you can opt to edit the Global (Org-wide default) policy. Do this by clicking its link.
  • If you want to create a custom setup policy, click the +Add button and give it a name.
• Under Installed Apps, press +Add apps and search for Connections
• Select it and press the Add button
• Under Pinned Apps, press +Add apps and search for Connections
• Select it and press the Add button
• You can reposition the Connections app in the App bar by dragging the app or using the Move up/Move down buttons
• Click Save and complete the following steps based on your choice earlier
  • Press Confirm to apply changes to the Global (Org-wide default) policy
  • Hit Save again once you’ve confirmed your selected user pinning option

Step 4: Customize the app name and logo

As a finishing touch, you can customize both the name and logo of the Connections app in the Microsoft Teams left navigation bar.

• Go back to the Teams Apps options in the MS Teams Admin Center
• Select Manage Apps
• Search for the Connections app and select it
• Click the Customize button
• In the Edit customization window, edit the Short name of the app. You can also upload your company logo, outline icon, and other customizations.
• Hit Apply and Publish the application

Excellent! You have now successfully pinned Viva Connections to the left App bar for all users with immediate access to the designated SharePoint home page. They also have instant access to all their SharePoint sites through the Viva Connections menu bar.

Related articles:

• How to Customize the Teams Design Element
• How to Pin a Modern SharePoint Page designed with ShortPoint to Microsoft Team's Sidebar (Advanced)