Places Public Preview Long on Promises

• Places, a connected workplace platform from Microsoft for managing hybrid work scheduling and resources, entered public preview in May 2024.
• The preview contains only basic capabilities with other features still pending; general availability is unlikely before late 2024, and some features may still be in preview at GA.
• Total costs for Places could be high, with Teams Premium, Teams Rooms Pro, and Copilot for Microsoft 365 required to enable all features.

Microsoft announced Places as a “connected workplace platform.” It is intended to help employees optimize their in-office time for collaboration with coworkers and find work and meeting spaces, while providing employers and facility managers with analytics to optimize facility usage. Although Microsoft originally announced Places in late 2022 for availability in 2023, it did not enter public preview until May 2024 as part of an announcement that included the introduction of Copilot integration with Places. This public preview currently includes only basic features and offers little of interest to potential customers until what Microsoft calls “advanced features” become available later in 2024.