Comparison between the Teams chat archive and Teams chat compliance archive jobs
Introduction
The Teams chat archive and Teams chat compliance archive jobs both archive the content of Microsoft Teams chats, but they differ significantly in purpose, scope, and behavior. This page compares the two jobs to help administrators understand their differences and choose the appropriate job for their archiving requirements.
Important: The Teams chat archive job cannot archive chats or meetings with external people. Use the Teams chat compliance archive job if you need to archive such chats and meetings.
Key differences
The most important difference is that the Teams chat compliance archive job is a backup solution designed specifically for archiving deleted messages and their content within Microsoft Teams.
Important: If a chat has already been archived using the Teams chat archive job, it is not possible to re-archive it using the Teams chat compliance archive job, and vice versa. Attempting to do so will result in an error, and the job will not process anything.
Feature comparison
The following table summarizes the similarities and differences between the two jobs:
| Features and functions | Teams chat archive job | Teams chat compliance archive job |
|---|---|---|
| Report mode | The report mode is enabled in the Teams chat archive job. | The report mode is disabled in the Teams chat compliance archive job. |
| Filtering settings | You can filter the chats and messages you wish to archive with the Teams chat archive job. | The filtering settings are disabled in the Teams chat compliance archive job. |
| Archive all or selected users | This option is enabled in the Teams chat archive job. | This option is enabled in the Teams chat compliance archive job. |
| Archive deleted messages | The Teams chat archive job returns an empty body for deleted messages when archiving a chat in which some messages were deleted before the archiving process. | The Teams chat compliance archive job, by its nature, archives deleted messages. |
| Archive hosted contents | This option is enabled in the Teams chat archive job. | This option is enabled in the Teams chat compliance archive job. |
| Archive deleted hosted contents | The Teams chat archive job returns an empty body for deleted hosted contents. | The Teams chat compliance archive job, by its nature, archives deleted hosted contents. |