Slack Technologies Inc. keeps growing, and it’s getting paid more for its team communications app too.

Slack now has more than 6 million daily active users, up from 5 million in January. It also has 50,000 paid teams with 2 million paid users and has crossed $200 million in annual recurring revenue.

In addition to its new user growth milestones, which it announced at its first Frontiers user conference in San Francisco Tuesday, Slack also rolled out various updates for its enterprise chat app, including Shared Channels.

Slack’s update comes just a day after rival Microsoft Corp. updated its Team app with guest access and less than a week after a new competitor joined the fray with the launch of Atlassian Corp. Plc’s new unified team communications service called Stride.  

Shared Channels

Slack has supported guest access for some years, but the new update introduces the ability to connect two organizations using Shared Channels.

Like regular channels in Slack, Shared Channels can be public or private, while team members on both sides will be able to post messages, upload files, use voice and video calling features, and send direct messages.

Shared Channel members won’t have to log into multiple Slack workspaces and will continue to have access to platform apps, such as collaboration on Dropbox documents, calls in Zoom and the like.

If you are part of a Shared Channel you will find them under a new Shared Channels header in the sidebar, while a double diamond symbol will display next to the channel name.

To learn more about team members of a Shared Channel, you can click on the person’s profile and view their full name, email address (depending on settings), time zone and the channels they are in. Any members outside your organization will have their team’s logo displayed in the corner of their profile avatar.  

Join the beta

Shared Channels is currently available in a beta for teams on Slack’s Standard and Plus plans. To get access to Shared Channels, administrators can enable the beta by going to the Team Menu and clicking on Shared channels (beta). Workspace Owners and administrators can create, share and accept shared channels.

Create a new Shared Channel

When creating a Shared Channel you will need to have the other organization’s Slack URL, plus an email address for a Workspace Owner or Admin.

Next to Shared Channels in the sidebar, click the “+” icon > select who can access your shared channel on your workspace > add a channel name > invite people from your workspace > click Next. To invite another workspace to your Shared Channel, add the administrator’s email address, Slack URL and a message > click “Create & Invite.”

Tip: You can stop sharing a channel by clicking on the gear icon > Additional options > Stop sharing this channel > Stop Sharing. All members will receive a Slackbot message alerting them that the channel is no longer shared.

Share an existing channel

Select the channel you want to share, click the gear icon > Additional options > click “Share this channel with another team” > select who can access your shared channel on your workspace > click Next. To invite another workspace to your Shared Channel, add the administrator’s email address, Slack URL and a message > click “Create & Invite.”

Note: If you choose to share an existing channel, the other workspace will be able to see all the detail in that channel, including message history, members and bots.  

Accept a Shared Channel request

When you receive a Shared Channel invitation, open the Slackbot > click View Invitation > review the details and click “Accept & Add Channel.”

Support for new languages

Despite being used in more than 100 countries, Slack was only available in English, but that changed yesterday with the announcement of support for French, German and Spanish, as well as Japanese later this year. In comparison, Microsoft Teams supports 18 languages.

Fifty-five percent of Slack’s more than 9 million weekly active users are outside the U.S., mostly in Europe and Asia. Japan and Germany have the third- and fourth-highest number of Slack users after the U.S. and the U.K., according to Slack Chief Executive Stewart Butterfield.

Image: Slack