Microsoft Teams Town Hall: Attendee Pack, Cost, and Alternatives

Microsoft is retiring Teams Live Events in July 2026 — events scheduled before that date will continue to run until 28 February 2027 (Source: Microsoft, 2025). The official successor is Microsoft Teams Town Hall: a unified surface for large broadcast events inside Teams. As soon as you need to reach more than 3,000 attendees, however, the new format gets expensive and inflexible fast — Microsoft sells additional capacity as Teams Events Attendee Packs, which you assign per organizer and which, in practice, lock you into at least a one-year contract. We explain what changed on 1 April 2026, what the packs cost — and when a specialized platform like SlideSync is the better choice.

Microsoft Teams Town Hall is the unified broadcast capability inside Teams for large, one-to-many events: a small group of presenters speaks to a large audience that interacts via Q&A or event chat but doesn’t actively use mic or camera. The new format replaces Teams Live Events as Microsoft’s recommended option for shareholder meetings, all-hands meetings, online town hall meetings and similar large-format events. Since 1 April 2026, several capabilities previously bundled with Teams Premium are part of Teams Enterprise — so the licensing landscape has shifted as well.

Microsoft has set a clear timeline:

• July 2026 — Teams Live Events is officially retired. From this point on, no new events can be scheduled.
• 28 February 2027 — events scheduled before retirement continue to run; after that, the capability ends entirely.

Microsoft recommends migrating all customers to Town Hall. If you’ve been using Live Events for recurring large-format events, now is the time to make a deliberate choice: the new format — or a specialized streaming platform.

With a standard Teams Enterprise license (or Microsoft 365 E3 / E5), Town Halls reach up to 3,000 attendees. An additional view-only mode with Q&A capability extends events to up to 10,000 viewers (Source: Microsoft Learn, 2026). Out of the box, you get:

• Q&A capability (default)
• Live captions and recording
• Embedded streaming inside the Microsoft 365 tenant
• Access for viewers with a Microsoft 365 account or as guests

If you need more reach, you’ll need additional licenses — the Teams Events Attendee Packs.

For audiences above 3,000 attendees, Microsoft sells seven tiered packs — from 5,000 up to 100,000 people. The important constraints:

• Assigned per organizer: each pack is bound to a specific person.
• Not shareable across the organization: if multiple employees need to host large Town Hall events, each one needs their own pack.
• Recurring license — no pay-per-event option; billed monthly, annually, or on a 3-year contract.

The table below shows list prices in the Microsoft 365 admin portal (as of 2026-05-04, no partner discount). Binding prices apply only through your Microsoft contract or a CSP partner.

Microsoft offers the packs in three contract terms:

• Monthly — highest flexibility, highest price.
• 1 year — the practical default.
• 3 years — about 5% discount versus the 1-year contract.

In theory that sounds flexible — in practice it rarely is. The reason isn’t the underlying contract with Microsoft (most enterprises already have one), but the internal processes around assignment. An Attendee Pack has to be bound to a specific person in the Teams Admin Center (under Meetings / Events → Attendee licenses) — typically by IT staff with the Teams Administrator or Global Administrator role, not by the event team themselves (details: Microsoft Learn — Manage Attendee Capacity Pack). On top of that come IT procurement / software asset management, works-council co-determination (relevant for larger internal events with recording and engagement analytics, particularly in the DACH region), and a data-protection review whenever the data flow changes. For a single event, this coordination process often takes longer than producing the event itself.

The consequence: the system effectively forces most organizations into a 1-year contract, even when only a single large event is planned. If you produce only one annual shareholder meeting or all-hands event with 5,000 attendees, you still pay roughly €14,700 a year at list prices — for one event day.

Three limitations are particularly relevant when migrating to Town Hall:

Embedding only inside the Microsoft 365 stack

Town Hall is built around the Microsoft 365 stack — the attendee view runs through the Teams client or Microsoft’s own web portals. Reliable embedding into your own corporate website or external intranet is officially not supported. Microsoft’s documentation describes this limitation only vaguely; in practice it doesn’t work. If you want to offer streaming on your own website — for external stakeholders, investors, or press — Town Hall is the wrong tool.

Branding stays at Microsoft level

Town Hall allows rudimentary branding — logo, banner, an accent color. The look and feel, however, remain visibly Microsoft: the player UI, the controls, the chat panel all follow the Teams design language. Full corporate design with your own typography, your own player skin, or an event microsite styled in line with your brand isn’t part of the offering. For internal employee events that’s usually acceptable; for shareholder meetings, investor events, or press conferences where the visual identity is part of the message, the off-the-shelf look quickly becomes a problem.

Third-party apps no longer appear in the attendee view

In Live Events, third-party apps like SlideSync or Slido could be displayed alongside the stream to give attendees additional capabilities such as polls, filtered Q&A, or voting. In the new Town Hall surface, apps are no longer available to attendees. Presenters and organizers can still use apps — but viewers no longer see them in the attendee view. How to close that gap specifically for Q&A is covered on our page about Teams Town Hall Q&A with SlideSync.

If you depend on these capabilities, on consistent branding, or on embedding the stream on your own site, you’ll either have to rebuild them externally — or choose a platform that closes precisely these gaps.

This is precisely what SlideSync is built for — the webcast platform from MediaEvent Services. Concretely:

• Flexibly bookable live support. Phone support is included in every subscription and every event package. If you want a producer reserved and online for a specific event window — sound check with presenters, standby for technical interventions, Q&A moderation, recording — dedicated live support is available as an hourly add-on, on short notice and without a separate contract framework. With Microsoft, comparable depth is only available through the Teams Events Hosting Assistance or Advanced Production Service — paid, recommended two-week lead time, booked through your Microsoft account team, requires a Unified support contract.
• Pricing matched to usage. Per-event packages for individual large formats, monthly or annual subscriptions for recurring event series. Scaling is included in each package — no per-organizer binding, no rigid contract terms.
• EU hosting and GDPR-compliant. Data processing exclusively within the European Union — relevant for regulated industries, listed companies, and anyone with data residency as a hard requirement.
• Embedding on your own website. Stream and Q&A drop straight into your corporate website, intranet, or a dedicated event microsite — without making your viewers depend on Microsoft 365.
• Full corporate design. Your own typography, your own colors, your own player skin, your own URL: SlideSync adapts to your brand identity, not the other way around. For shareholder meetings, IR calls, and press conferences where the visual identity is part of the message, that’s a hard advantage.
• Q&A interface with swimlane view and filters. Designed specifically for backend teams moderating many questions in parallel during large events. Customer feedback is consistently positive — most prefer our tool over the standard Q&A in Teams.
• Browser-based for all viewers. No Microsoft 365 license required — attendees just open a link.

When is Microsoft Teams Live Events being retired?

In July 2026. Events scheduled before that date will continue to run until 28 February 2027. Microsoft recommends migrating to Town Hall — alternatively, a specialized platform like SlideSync offers more flexibility without a license commitment.

How many attendees can Town Hall support by default?

Up to 3,000 with the standard license, up to 10,000 in view-only mode with Q&A. For larger audiences — up to 100,000 — Attendee Packs are required, each assigned to one organizer.

Can Attendee Packs be shared across the organization?

No. Each pack is bound to one person and isn’t shareable between employees. If several people in your organization need to host large Town Halls, every one of them needs their own pack — which makes the solution noticeably more expensive in practice than the list prices suggest.

How much does a Teams Town Hall Attendee Pack cost?

List prices start at €1,228 per month for 5,000 attendees on a 1-year contract and scale up to €24,223 per month for 100,000 attendees. The 3-year term offers approximately 5% discount. Important: the licenses are per organizer and aren’t shareable internally.

Can Microsoft Teams Town Hall be embedded on my own website?

Not reliably. Town Hall runs through the Teams client or Microsoft’s own web portals; embedding on third-party websites isn’t officially supported. If you need streaming on your own website, a specialized platform like SlideSync is the better fit.

Do SlideSync or Slido work as apps inside Microsoft Teams Town Hall?

Third-party apps are no longer available to viewers in the new surface. Presenters and organizers can still use apps — but the attendee view doesn’t show them. For Q&A, polling, or voting capabilities directly for attendees, an integrated platform like SlideSync is the cleaner solution.

Microsoft Teams Town Hall fits smaller internal employee meetings — typically under 3,000 attendees, within the standard license, no Attendee Packs required. For pure in-house updates to your workforce, where your IT team handles production in-house and the standard Teams interface fits your audience, the platform is functionally sufficient.

SlideSync is the better choice as soon as you’re running a professional production — and at that point you need a professional tool. Specifically:

• C-level appearances, shareholder meetings, IR calls, press conferences. These formats demand a higher service level: a dedicated producer and platform team online for the duration of the broadcast, an escalation path that goes directly to the platform rather than through regular support channels, and immediate response to live incidents. With SlideSync, phone support is included in every subscription and every event package by default; dedicated live support (a producer reserved and online for your event window) is available as a flexible hourly add-on — short notice, no separate contract framework. With Microsoft, comparable depth is only available through the paid Teams Events Hosting Assistance or Advanced Production Service — recommended two-week lead time, booked through your Microsoft account team, requires a Unified support contract.
• Structured Q&A moderation. As soon as your Q&A needs to be curated, filtered, or approved — the case for any event with external visibility — Teams’ default Q&A is no longer sufficient.
• Embedding on your own website or full corporate design. When the visual identity is part of the message — almost always the case for IR events, investor updates, and press conferences — the standard Teams interface falls short.
• Audiences above 3,000 attendees. As soon as you need to scale beyond the standard license, you’re looking at per-organizer-assigned Attendee Packs. Per-event packages with SlideSync are typically the more economical and more flexible option at this scale.
• GDPR-compliant EU hosting as a hard requirement. Relevant for regulated industries, listed companies, and anyone where data residency is non-negotiable.

SlideSync is economically flexible: per-event packages for individual large formats, monthly or annual subscriptions for recurring event series. Which variant fits depends entirely on your event frequency.

Not sure which solution fits your setup? Talk to us — we advise vendor-independently.

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