O365 Stream



As of March 1, 2021 Office 365 Video is retired. Any remaining customers in public and GCC regions have been automatically migrated to Microsoft Stream. This concludes the transition of Office 365 Video to Microsoft Stream that was announced in 2016. If your organization has not been migrated yet it's because your migration ran into an issue. See step-by-step instructions here: to download XSplit Broadc. Microsoft Stream works well with other Office 365 apps like Teams, SharePoint, OneNote, and Yammer, giving even more ways to discover more relevant content. If you are using Office 365 Video and want to transition to Microsoft Stream, see Transition from Office 365 Video. Collaborate for free with online versions of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and OneNote. Save documents, spreadsheets, and presentations online, in OneDrive. Microsoft Stream is a cloud service licensed on a per user subscription basis. It is available as part of eligible Office 365 subscriptions. See Microsoft 365 pricing for the information for each subscription type. Microsoft Stream for Microsoft 365.

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Microsoft Stream is a cloud service licensed on a per user subscription basis. It is available as part of eligible Office 365 subscriptions. See Microsoft 365 pricing for the information for each subscription type.

Microsoft Stream for Microsoft 365

Microsoft Stream capabilities vary based on the Microsoft 365 subscription and the following table highlights the functionality differences by subscription.

Firstline F1 GCC, GCC High, DoD F1 '1'Education A1Microsoft 365 Business Premium / EssentialsEnterprise E1/E3 Education A3 GCC, GCC High, DoD E1/E3/M365 G3 '1'Enterprise E5 Education A5 GCC, GCC High, DoD E5 '1'Microsoft 365 Stream feature add-on
View videos or live events
Upload/modify videos
Create live events in Microsoft Stream
Create live events in Microsoft Teams/Yammer
Search automatically generated transcripts

'1' GCC High, and GCC DoD licenses and environments are coming later for Microsoft Stream. Live events and Stream mobile app are not yet available for GCC but are coming soon.

Trial

Learn more about Microsoft Stream trial licensing and quotas

Note

O365 Stream

To purchase Microsoft Stream for an organization, you must be a Microsoft 365 Global Admin or Billing Admin, or you must create a new Microsoft 365 tenant.

Storage

Microsoft Stream includes a base amount of storage. A Microsoft Stream tenant receives a fixed allocation of 500 GB of storage and an extra 0.5 GB of storage per licensed user* as illustrated in the following table. For more information about how to purchase the separate storage add-on, see Microsoft Stream Storage add-on.

Microsoft Stream’s storage is available to all videos in the tenant and is pooled for use by all users, making it easier to manage availability of storage across your organization. Only the original video file size counts against your pooled storage. Transcoded videos, thumbnails, channel poster, subtitle and caption files, do not contribute towards your storage.

Note

Microsoft 365 Enterprise K1/F1 users are not included and do not contribute to extra storage quota.

Next steps

Review Microsoft Stream features and functionalities

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Important

The information contained in this topic is meant to provide a preview of the upcoming version of Microsoft Stream which will be launched later this year. Some features, screens, or functionality included in this topic may be modified, replaced, or removed without notice in the final release. Also, any release date mentioned is an estimate and may change.

A new vision for Microsoft Stream empowers users to create, share, discover, and manage video just as they would any other file.

With video that will be stored in Microsoft 365, the new version of Stream builds on the rich content management features of SharePoint and unlocks the intelligence of Microsoft Graph to enhance videos across Microsoft 365. The earlier version of Stream will now be known as Microsoft Stream (Classic) and Microsoft Stream will continue as the name for the new version.

Microsoft Stream—the intelligent video app in Microsoft 365—is being re-imagined and rebuilt to integrate seamlessly with applications across the suite, so you can create, share, discover, and manage video as easily as any Office document.

Video and audio files will be stored on the SharePoint files platform within Microsoft 365 like all other file types. Already today, SharePoint powers file experiences for Microsoft Teams, OneDrive, Yammer, and Outlook. This will provide the best of both worlds:

  • intelligent video experiences powered by Stream across the suite, and
  • management of video that leverages the power of SharePoint content services for permissions, sharing, compliance, governance, and customizable portal experiences.

Customers who want to create future-proof video experiences in Microsoft 365 can start building them today with SharePoint Online and Microsoft Graph File APIs.

O365 Streamer

Note

For customers using Microsoft Stream (Classic), we will support your transition to Microsoft Stream over time, with a phased introduction of new features in Microsoft 365, migration tools, and guidance. The first key functionality we’re enabling in 2020 are improvements to Teams Meeting Recordings, by having new meeting recordings saved to OneDrive and SharePoint, which enables key sharing and governance features.

Informational videos about Microsoft Stream

Vision

Microsoft Stream empowers every Microsoft 365 user to achieve more with fast, intelligent video.

To achieve that vision:

  • Stream expands its role to unlock the intelligence of Microsoft Graph and enhance videos across the Microsoft 365 services.

  • Stream web app follows the model of the Office web apps to easily work with video like any other document format.

  • Stream videos—like any files—can be uploaded and accessed from Teams, Yammer, SharePoint, and OneDrive.

  • Stream leverages the power of SharePoint content services to store and manage video using integrated Microsoft 365 compliance, governance, permissions, external sharing, go local storage, bring your own keys, and government environments.

  • Stream is flexible to allow customers to use a provided video portal template to easily modify and brand their own video portals or fully customize and integrate video experiences with their intranet and Microsoft 365.

  • Stream delivers new intelligent capabilities including, faster and more effective consumption of video content, quick location and extraction of relevant snippets of video, and easy end-user tools to capture screens and record video in Stream and across all Microsoft 365 apps.

Microsoft Stream (Classic) vs Microsoft Stream

The use cases for Stream (Classic) and Stream are the same however, the way in which those use cases are accomplished throughout Microsoft 365 is going to change slightly in Stream.

Microsoft Stream (Classic)

Stream (Classic) is loosely connected to other Microsoft 365 apps and services, but videos are stored separately. You upload your videos, manage them there, then link to those videos in other places and applications.

Do more with files
File creation & get back to your files
Storage & files
How video & Stream (Classic) previously fit into Microsoft 365
O365 stream storage

Microsoft Stream

In Stream, you upload videos the same way you upload any other file, and they're automatically stored within the SharePoint files platform. Videos are played, enhanced, and edited by the newest version of the Stream web app and embeddable player. In fact, videos across Microsoft 365 (in SharePoint, OneDrive, Yammer, and Teams) will be considered Stream videos, powered by the SharePoint files platform. And just like other Office file types, Stream videos can be shared with coherent permissions in all Microsoft 365 apps.

Do more with files
File creation & get back to your files
Storage & files
How video and Microsoft Stream fits into Microsoft 365

Flexible video organization

There are many ways that people use and organize videos within their organization. Those common uses cases fall on a continuum from more locked down or constrained (on the left, below) to fully democratized (on the right, below) where everyone is encouraged to create videos to share.

Common use #1:
Employee personal or private
Common use #2:
Organization-wide top down
Common use #3:
Team collaboration
Common use #4:
Organization-wide collaboration
If you want ...Simple video sharing and discovery of relevant team and organization videos that you can viewAnyone in the organization can view, but only a few can add videosOnly team members can view and add videosAnyone in the organization can add videos that anyone can view
For example ...• Single video editing and sharing with individuals or with a link
• Getting back to your videos or those shared with you across Teams, Yammer, SharePoint and OneDrive
• Recording or uploading a new video
• Messages from the CEO or other leaders
• Human Resources information
• Onboarding training for new employees
• Any sort of team
• Departments or divisions where everyone can contribute
• Single organization-wide video portal destination
• Organization-wide video portal destination for specific topics or content
Use ...Stream web app and OneDrivePublic SharePoint Communication Site or Public Yammer CommunityPrivate Teams teamOption A: Rollup organization-wide video through a SharePoint communication site with highlighted content webparts scoped to videos across all sites
Option B: Single destination for uploaded videos through a public SharePoint communication site that is open to all to upload
◀◾◾◾◾
Constrained
◾◾◾◾▶
Democratized

O365 Stream License

If you want to help inform the roadmap, please:

  • add your ideas and vote for features on our Stream ideas forum: https://aka.ms/StreamIdeas/

  • connect with us directly by enrolling in our customer connection program: https://aka.ms/StreamConnect

Frequently asked questions

Will there be a migration from Stream (Classic) to Microsoft Stream?

O365 Stream

This new vision for Stream does mean that existing content will need to be migrated from Microsoft Stream (Classic) to Microsoft Stream to take full advantage of all that SharePoint and Microsoft 365 has to offer. Learn more about how this migration will work

Is there still a Stream application?

Yes, the newest version of the Stream web app will be tightly integrated with office.com. It will be just like when you select PowerPoint from the Microsoft 365 app launcher—you go to office.com and can access the PowerPoint files that are stored across Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive, and Yammer. You'll select Stream to access all your videos and create new ones.

Where will video files be stored?

O365 Stream

Videos in Microsoft Stream will be stored in the same place you store your Office files, in Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive, and Yammer. Stream will enhance those videos—powering the playback and adding intelligent video experiences on top.

O365 Stream Share With External Users

How will storage quota work?

Videos in Microsoft Stream will consume the existing file storage quota from OneDrive and SharePoint, which means there are lots of storage management tools and the ability to monitor and clean up content, as needed.

Also, Teams meeting recordings make up the majority of many customers’ current Stream storage, so the fact that this content is shifting heavily to OneDrive means most meetings won’t consume your SharePoint storage quota. Also, if you have the right Microsoft 365 security and compliance licenses, you can add automatic retention labels and policies via the Microsoft 365 compliance center to target and clean up meeting recordings after a certain number of days.

We'll be adding a new feature for all expired license types that deletes meeting recordings automatically after a certain number of days, so IT admins who want to change that time limit can do so, and the user will be able to flag specific recordings that need to be kept longer.

How is video playback different in the Microsoft Stream (SharePoint and OneDrive) vs Stream (Classic)?

Stream (Classic) pre-encodes and encrypts all video uploads to multiple bitrate and resolutions for adaptive bitrate streaming through CDN.

Today, OneDrive and SharePoint video playback use different playback technology depending on the video bitrate.

O365 Stream

  • Smaller videos (<3 Mbps bitrate or video itself is <5 Mb) - Use progressive playback, so the video needs to be created with a video codec supported by the browser and the device

  • Medium bitrate videos (3-50 Mbps) and Microsoft Teams meeting recordings - Use 'just in time' encoding to do adaptive bitrate streaming on the fly when a user plays the video and caches AES-128 encrypted parts of the video on the Azure Front Door CDN as many people play the video from the same geographic region

  • Large bitrate videos (50+ Mbps) - Cannot be played in the service and can be only downloaded for local playback

Over time, Microsoft Stream will improve the above playback technology that exists in OneDrive and SharePoint to ensure a high-quality and performant playback experience that matches Microsoft Stream (Classic), where you don't need to worry about bitrates or codecs for your videos. You just upload your video and Stream ensures your viewers can play it back at scale.

Microsoft Stream Account

O365 Stream

As a Stream admin, can I still act on all Stream (Classic) videos in Stream?

The Stream admin role only applies to Stream (Classic).

O365 Streams

Currently, SharePoint admins can act on any file stored in SharePoint. This ability will remain true for any videos, too. If an admin finds a set of videos from links sent to them or through an audit or eDiscovery search, a SharePoint admin can then add themselves as a site admin for the user's OneDrive or add themselves as a site admin of a shared site, then they can act on all files within it.

Microsoft Stream Plan 1

See also