Microsoft Teams is the fastest growing business app in Microsoft history, and Citrix was the first partner in the world to optimize the Microsoft Teams experience in a virtualized environment for Windows and Linux. Today we are excited to announce that we are bringing our full optimization to Mac with the release of Citrix Workspace app 2012 for Mac! Together, Citrix with Microsoft Teams accelerates team collaboration and personal productivity across all business activity.

With this Citrix Workspace app release, your teams now get a native Microsoft Teams app experience on their virtual apps and desktops for audio calls, video calls, and screensharing. Among several immediate benefits, both admins and users will be able to enjoy:

  • Crystal clear voice and video up to 720p
  • Enhanced server scalability that is accomplished by offloading CPU/RAM/GPU/IO onto the user’s device rather than the Virtual Delivery Agent (VDA). That means more users per server and lower operating costs.
  • The ability to leverage existing Citrix security policies within virtual instances of Microsoft Teams

Please note, this optimization is supported on macOS version 10.15 (Catalina) and above.

What’s New?

With our continuous innovation, we focus on improving both user and admin experience. This chart compares the optimizations we have made for you today with the capabilities we previously had in place.

Before With Microsoft Teams Optimization
For Skype for Business optimization, a separate installer (RTME) installed in the client machine as .dmg file (~15MB) All the Teams optimization code is embedded by default into Citrix Workspace app, so you do not need to manage a separate plugin
Teams rendered via legacy HDX technology natively on the VDA. Authentication, signaling, data collaboration happens natively between VDA and Microsoft Cloud With the new API from Citrix to Microsoft, Teams application in VDA can interact with VDA side services. The services in turn open a control virtual channel (CTXMTOP*) to the new Citrix Workspace app-side media engine for Teams based on WebRTC. Reverse seamless snaps-in the local Citrix Workspace app window back into the hosted Microsoft Teams app.
No auto configuration based on encoding and supported resolution Performance estimator assesses optimization based on end point capabilities in terms of encoding and maximum resolution supported and limits itself.

Please note, CTXMTOP is a command-and-control virtual channel. That means media is not exchanged between the Citrix Workspace app and the VDA.

There are a few known limitations with Microsoft Teams running on VDI on Mac compared to the native Microsoft Teams application. This includes the absence of the gallery view. While Skype for Business can coexist with Microsoft Teams, they cannot run at the same time.  Microsoft has an extensive deployment guide for this. Additionally, to preserve VDA resources on the workspace app, we have disabled background effects on Microsoft Teams. Check out our documentation for more information.

How do I know if Microsoft Teams is optimized for me?

On the Workspace app, navigate to the Microsoft Teams app and log in. Under your name, select About → Version and, if optimized, you’ll see “Citrix HDX Optimized” after your Microsoft Teams version.

Citrix has optimized multimedia with Microsoft Teams for you with this change, but there are some additional things you can do to deliver the best user experience when deploying Teams to your Mac users. Below are a few steps to take to optimize general resource consumption with Microsoft Teams:

  • Select “Do Not Auto-Start Teams” from Microsoft Teams settings
  • If the virtual desktop does not have a GPU/vGPU, we recommend “Disable GPU hardware acceleration” in Teams’ settings to improve performance.
  • Ensure you are leveraging the latest VDA and Citrix Workspace app for Mac

Ready to bring Microsoft Teams optimization to your Mac users? Download the latest Workspace app for Mac. Additionally, you must be running VDA 1906.2 or higher to have out-of-the-box support. Get started today, and let us know what you think!