Use the Microsoft Search API to search Teams messages

Use the Microsoft Search API in Microsoft Graph to search for information in Teams messages, return messages ranked by relevance, and render a dedicated search experience. The search applies to the body and attachments of messages in the signed-in user's Teams messages.

Caution

The search API schema has changed in the beta version. Some properties in a search request and response have been renamed or removed. For details, see Schema change deprecation warning. The examples in this topic show the up-to-date schema.

Teams message search also looks for attachments. The supported file types for message attachment search are the same as those for SharePoint Online search.

Examples

Example 1: Search Teams chat message

Request

The following example queries Teams chat messages in the signed-in user's Teams chat storage that contains the string "test" in any part of the chat message (the sender name, message body, or any attachments). The query returns the first 25 results. The search results are ordered by descending dateTime.

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/beta/search/query
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "requests": [
    {
      "entityTypes": [
        "chatMessage"
      ],
      "query": {
        "queryString": "test"
      },
      "from": 0,
      "size": 25
    }
  ]
}

Response

The following is an example of the response, which contains one message that matches the search criterion.

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-type: application/json

{
    "value": [
        {
            "searchTerms": [
                "test"
            ],
            "hitsContainers": [
                {
                    "hits": [
                        {
                            "hitId": "AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8+BjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA=",
                            "rank": 1,
                            "summary": "...Test with the TDF account",
                            "resource": {
                                "@odata.type": "microsoft.graph.chatMessage",
                                "id": "1657782060227",
                                "createdDateTime": "2022-07-14T07:01:01Z",
                                "lastModifiedDateTime": "2022-07-14T07:01:03Z",
                                "subject": "",
                                "importance": "normal",
                                "webLink": "https://outlook.office365.com/owa/?ItemID=AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8%2BBjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA%3D&exvsurl=1&viewmodel=ReadMessageItem",
                                "from": {
                                    "emailAddress": {
                                        "name": "Goncalo Torres",
                                        "address": "[email protected]"
                                    }
                                },
                                "channelIdentity": {},
                                "etag": "1657782060227",
                                "chatId": "19:[email protected]"
                            }
                        }
                    ],
                    "total": 1,
                    "moreResultsAvailable": false
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Example 2: Search top results messages

Request

The following example uses the search query shown in Example 1, and sorts the results by relevance.

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/search/query
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "requests": [
    {
      "entityTypes": [
        "chatMessage"
      ],
      "query": {
        "queryString": "test"
      },
      "from": 0,
      "size": 15,
      "enableTopResults": true
    }
  ]
}

Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-type: application/json

{
    "value": [
        {
            "searchTerms": [
                "test"
            ],
            "hitsContainers": [
                {
                    "hits": [
                        {
                            "hitId": "AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8+BjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA=",
                            "rank": 1,
                            "summary": "...Test with the TDF account",
                            "resource": {
                                "@odata.type": "microsoft.graph.chatMessage",
                                "id": "1657782060227",
                                "createdDateTime": "2022-07-14T07:01:01Z",
                                "lastModifiedDateTime": "2022-07-14T07:01:03Z",
                                "subject": "",
                                "importance": "normal",
                                "webLink": "https://outlook.office365.com/owa/?ItemID=AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8%2BBjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA%3D&exvsurl=1&viewmodel=ReadMessageItem",
                                "from": {
                                    "emailAddress": {
                                        "name": "Goncalo Torres",
                                        "address": "[email protected]"
                                    }
                                },
                                "channelIdentity": {},
                                "etag": "1657782060227",
                                "chatId": "19:[email protected]"
                            }
                        }
                    ],
                    "total": 1,
                    "moreResultsAvailable": false
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Example 3: Search Teams Message with KQL

Supported scope terms

You can use the following scope terms in your Keyword Query Language (KQL) query.

Scope Terms Description Example
from Search only for messages sent by scoped person. from:bob
hasAttachment Search only for messages that contain or don't contain attachments. hasAttachment:true
IsRead Search only for messages that were or weren't read. IsRead:true
IsMentioned Search only for messages that did or didn't mention you. IsMentioned:true
mentions Search only for messages that mentioned somebody. mentions:497b7a2a9e1a48d780e82965d2fc3a81 (This is user ID without '-')
sent Search only for messages sent to the scoped date range. sent > 2022-07-14
to Search only for messages sent to the scoped person, partially supported for the one-on-one message. to:bob

Request

The following example shows how to search a message that contains Contoso that Bob sent to Alice after 2022-07-14.

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/search/query
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "requests": [
    {
      "entityTypes": [
        "chatMessage"
      ],
      "query": {
        "queryString": "contoso from:bob to:alice sent>2022-07-14"
      },
      "from": 0,
      "size": 15,
      "enableTopResults": true
    }
  ]
}

Response

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-type: application/json

{
    "value": [
        {
            "searchTerms": [
                "test"
            ],
            "hitsContainers": [
                {
                    "hits": [
                        {
                            "hitId": "AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8+BjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT/HAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA=",
                            "rank": 1,
                            "summary": "...Contoso Test with the TDF account",
                            "resource": {
                                "@odata.type": "microsoft.graph.chatMessage",
                                "id": "1657782060227",
                                "createdDateTime": "2022-07-15T07:01:01Z",
                                "lastModifiedDateTime": "2022-07-15T07:01:03Z",
                                "subject": "",
                                "importance": "normal",
                                "webLink": "https://outlook.office365.com/owa/?ItemID=AAMkAGIwMDA5MmY0LWY5ZTgtNGY5YS04NzczLWNhNjc0ZGIyZDBjYgBGAAAAAADm35sgHbzESapJ8%2BBjBlhEBwDAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAAAAAEpAADAYtphe7dsRbDrOT%2FHAHoKAAFwxQGaAAA%3D&exvsurl=1&viewmodel=ReadMessageItem",
                                "from": {
                                    "emailAddress": {
                                        "name": "bob",
                                        "address": "[email protected]"
                                    }
                                },
                                "channelIdentity": {},
                                "etag": "1657782060228",
                                "chatId": "19:[email protected]"
                            }
                        }
                    ],
                    "total": 1,
                    "moreResultsAvailable": false
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

Known limitations

  • You can access only the signed-in user's Teams message or the message the user is included in.
  • The search Teams API doesn't return all properties defined in chatMessage. You can use the Teams API to retrieve more details about any single message.
  • For Teams messages, the total property of the searchHitsContainer type contains the number of results on the page, not the total number of matching results.
  • Sorting results isn't supported for messages.
  • You can't use this API with other entity types at this time.

JSON representation

Here's a JSON representation of all retrievable properties currently available for chatMessage search.

{
  "channelIdentity": {"@odata.type": "microsoft.graph.channelIdentity"},
  "chatId": "string",
  "createdDateTime": "string (timestamp)",
  "etag": "string",
  "from": {"@odata.type": "microsoft.graph.chatMessageFromIdentitySet"},
  "id": "string (identifier)",
  "importance": "string",
  "lastModifiedDateTime": "string (timestamp)",
  "subject": "string",
  "webUrl": "string"
}

Next steps