In Microsoft Teams, just like in many modern messaging apps, a tiny eye icon appears next to a message the moment the recipient opens it. This “Read Receipt” confirms to the sender that you have seen their text. While helpful in some situations, it can create immense pressure to reply immediately. If you are deeply focused on a project and just want to quickly glance at a message to ensure it is not an emergency, that tiny eye icon essentially forces you into a conversation before you are ready.
To reclaim your focus and eliminate the anxiety of “leaving someone on read,” you can completely disable read receipts across your entire Teams account. When you turn this off, your colleagues will never know whether you have seen their message or not—it will always just show a generic “Sent” checkmark on their end.
Disabling Read Receipts in Teams Settings
The toggle for this feature is located within your account’s core privacy settings. It is a global setting, meaning you cannot disable it for specific people; it is an all-or-nothing switch.
- Open the Microsoft Teams desktop application (or log in via the web browser).
- Look for your Profile picture (or your initials) in the top right corner of the window, near the minimize and close buttons, and click it.
- Select Settings from the dropdown menu.
- In the left-hand navigation sidebar of the settings menu, click on Privacy.
- Look for the section labelled Read receipts.
- Click the toggle switch to turn it Off.
Important Considerations When Disabling Receipts
Before you flip the switch, there are two critical things you must understand about how Microsoft Teams handles this privacy feature.
First, the feature is completely reciprocal. If you disable read receipts so that other people cannot see when you read their messages, you will also lose the ability to see when they read yours. Your sent messages will only ever display the standard “Delivered” checkmark, regardless of whether the recipient has opened the chat.
Second, this setting might be greyed out and locked by your organisation’s IT administrator. Many corporate IT departments force read receipts to remain active to ensure accountability and track internal communications. If the toggle switch is visible but you cannot click it, you must contact your IT helpdesk to request an exception, as there is no local workaround to bypass an admin policy.