Hi, I am struggling with combining my chat, meeting chat and channels into one list sorted by the most recent, I have used 'Customised View' both 'Combined' and 'Separate' but this only shows Chat and I need to click Channels or Meeting Chats, help please

Dear @Daniel Jennings,

Thank you for reaching out to Microsoft Q&A forum. 

I understand that you're looking to combine chats, meeting chats, and channels into one list sorted by the most recent. Unfortunately, Teams does not currently offer a single, sortable list that merges these three distinct conversation types.

The reason Teams separates these items is due to their structural difference on the backend:

1. Chat & Meeting Chats: These are private/group conversations managed through a user's Exchange Mailbox and are designed for rapid, informal communication. They are typically ephemeral (quick to appear and disappear from view).
2. Channel Posts: These are public, team-wide conversations managed through a SharePoint site. They are designed to be persistent, categorized, and searchable, often containing files and structured replies.

Since they live in different storage locations (Exchange vs. SharePoint), combining them into one chronological view is currently not supported.
The combined view you mentioned refers to combining chats and channels into a single list, but it’s still divided into two sections. You can sort each section by Most recent:

Chats and Teams chats: Click the three dots next to Chat and select Sort by most recent.

Teams and channels: Switch to Channels only, then sort by Most recent.

For reference: The new chat and channels experience in Microsoft Teams

The most effective workaround is not to check them manually, but to rely on the Activity Feed and Notifications to ensure you don't miss anything important.

The Activity feed (the bell icon in the top left) is the closest thing to a combined list, though it is filtered by what involves you directly.

• The feed shows you direct messages, replies to your channel posts, mentions (@mentions), and reactions to your messages. It effectively highlights everything you need to act on.
• If you click the Filter button (funnel icon) in the Activity feed, you can refine the list by unread messages, mentions, reactions, etc. You should check this feed regularly, as it aggregates critical activity across Chats, Channels, and Meetings.

If you are missing discussions in channels, you need to adjust your notification settings for those channels:

1. Go to the specific Team and Channel.
2. Click the three dots (...) next to the channel name.
3. Select Channel notifications.
4. For important channels, set the notification setting "Notify me for all new posts" to Show in activity and banner and check the box for "Include thread replies."

This ensures that every new post in that channel creates an alert in your Activity feed, acting as a chronological marker.

If you are reading a long thread and want to ensure you don't forget to follow up, use the Save feature:

1. Hover over the message you need to remember.
2. Click the three dots (...) that appear on the message.
3. Select Save message.
4. To view all your saved items (including Chats, Meetings, and Channels), go to Saved in the left pane.

This provides a separate, manual list of crucial conversations from all sources.

Unfortunately, until Microsoft changes the underlying architecture, the full, chronological combination of all three types of conversations remains unavailable. 

I really understand how convenient this feature would be for your workflow. I want you to know that I wish I had a way to change it for you directly but as a moderator of Q&A forum, my ability to assist is with the existing product functionality and the power to influence its design rests entirely with our product development team. We appreciate your kindness and understanding as we deal with these evolutionary product changes. Please get in touch if you need anything else.  

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Dear @Daniel Jennings,

It has been a while and I am writing to see how things are going with this issue. If there’s anything else I can assist you with or if you need further clarification, please don’t hesitate to let me know, I’m here to help. Looking forward to hearing from you. Wishing you a great day ahead!