grok bot for teams

Grok Bot for Teams: Slack vs Microsoft Teams vs Ando

Where should your team's Grok Bot live? How Grok Bot connects to Slack, Microsoft Teams and Ando: identity, what it can read, multiple bots, setup effort.

By Sara Du

17 min read · Last updated October 24, 2026

Grok Bot can work with all three, but it gets in differently each time. In Slack, a shared Team Bot gets its own Slack app and handle, so teammates can @mention it in channels and it posts as itself. In Microsoft Teams, there's no Grok Bot that lives inside Teams. The official Teams plugin connects Grok Bot to your own Microsoft account, so it searches, reads and sends Teams messages as you, from outside Teams, and nobody can @mention it there. In Ando, Grok Bot joins the workspace through the official Ando plugin as a member with its own identity, inbox and channel memberships. If your team already lives in Slack, start with a Slack Team Bot. If you live in Microsoft 365, the Teams plugin works for one person's tasks, not as a shared teammate. If you run several bots and want them in the room as coworkers, that's what Ando is built for.

We build Ando, so we have a point of view. Every Grok Bot, Slack and Microsoft fact below comes from the vendor's own docs, checked on Oct 22, 2026, with links. Grok Bot ships changes almost every week (changelog), so check again before you roll anything out.

The short answer, in one table

	Slack	Microsoft Teams	Ando
How Grok Bot gets in	A personal Slack connection (Connect apps), or a Team Bot with its own Slack app	The official Teams plugin (Connect apps), which connects your own Teams account. No Grok Bot app lives inside Teams	The official Ando plugin (Connect apps), backed by Ando's MCP server at `mcp.ando.so/mcp`
Whose identity it posts as	Personal connection: you. Team Bot: itself, with its own handle	You. The plugin uses delegated permissions, so it acts as the Microsoft account you connected (an app "can do only what that account can already do")	The agent identity you approve: an agent member you manage (or you, if you choose)
What it can read	Team Bot: channels it has joined, plus threads it's mentioned in	The chats and channels your own Microsoft account can access	Only conversations the agent is a participant in. Every member, human or agent, appears in the participant list
How work reaches it	@mention or DM. It follows threads after it's mentioned, and a channel-listener routine can make it respond to every message	You ask it in Grok Bot. Teammates can't @mention it in Teams, because it isn't a member there	Mentions, DMs and thread updates land in its agent inbox. A webhook routine wakes it when it's idle
Several bots in one place	Each Team Bot is its own Slack app. From a Slack thread, a Team Bot can hand work to the asker's own Bots	No separate bots. Team Bots are Slack-only, and the Teams connection is account-wide, so every Bot on your account uses it as you	Your choice: give each Grok Bot its own agent identity, or connect several to one shared identity. Agents can @mention and wake each other, with loop limits
Setup effort	Medium: needs a Cursor team, publishing, Slack app approval, and each teammate linking Slack	Low for one person: add the plugin and sign in. A work tenant may need Azure AD (Microsoft Entra) admin consent	Low: invite an agent in Ando, add the plugin, approve, then paste one receiving prompt
Best for	Teams that already live in Slack and want one shared bot per job	Microsoft 365 teams where one person wants Grok Bot to search and act in Teams for them	Teams running several agents that should work like teammates

Sources for every cell are in the sections below and in Sources.

First, what "Grok Bot for teams" actually means

Grok Bot has two kinds of bots, and the difference decides almost everything here.

Personal Bots belong to one person. Apps you connect, like Gmail or Slack, "belong to the same account you used to sign in to Grok Bot", and a connected app "can do only what that account can already do in that service" (Connect apps).
Team Bots launched on Sep 26, 2026. A Team Bot is "a Bot one person owns and shares with their Cursor team", and each person's chat with it is private (Team Bots help; announcement). Team Bots always run in the cloud, and to create one you need to be on a Cursor team.

Ask yourself which you want: a bot that does work for one person inside the team's chat, or a bot that is a participant the whole team can talk to. Slack supports both today. Microsoft Teams supports only the first: Grok Bot works through your account from outside Teams. Ando is built around the second.

Grok Bot in Slack

Slack is where Grok Bot's team features are most developed.

How it gets in. There are two separate paths:

Your personal Slack connection. Add Slack under Connect apps. Grok Bot's docs are blunt about what that means: "The Slack app posts as the Slack user you connected, not as a separate bot that has to be invited. It can post only in channels that user can post in" (Connect apps).
A Team Bot with its own Slack app. "A published Team Bot can have its own Slack app, named after the Bot and using its avatar. Teammates can DM it or @mention it in channels… It posts as itself, not as the owner" (Team Bots docs). Each Team Bot is a separate Slack app with its own handle.

What it can see and when it speaks. A Team Bot answers when someone @mentions it in a conversation it has been added to, then follows that thread so later replies wake it without another mention. It "ignores top-level messages that don't mention it" unless you set up a Slack channel-listener routine (Team Bots docs). The changelog adds that Team Bots "read channels they've joined", stay quiet on untagged replies that don't need them, and can mention a Slack user group, while @here and @channel still don't ping anyone (changelog, Sep 26 and Oct 7).

Whose access it uses. In Slack channels, threads and group chats, "a Team Bot uses only its owner's apps, and asks before it uses your accounts." The Bot "never lends one person's access to another" (Team Bots help; docs). Risky actions in a thread get a Review an action card that only the person who asked can answer.

Who can use it. The Bot answers only people who have linked their Slack account to Cursor (Settings → General → Team Bots). A teammate's use counts against their own Grok Bot allowance, not the owner's (docs).

Multiple bots. Each Team Bot is its own Slack app, so a channel can hold several. From a Slack thread or DM, a Team Bot "can hand work to that person's own Bots, and their replies are posted back into the same thread". A personal Bot can't hand work to other Bots from a shared channel thread (Group chats and Bot-to-Bot messages). Admins can turn off messaging between Bots for the whole team (changelog, Oct 14).

The Slack side. If your workspace requires app approval, the Team Bot setup sends Slack's approval request and waits on Awaiting admin approval (docs; Slack's own app approval guide). In Slack's model, a bot's channels:history access covers "public channels that your Slack app has been added to" (Slack scope reference). Slack is also moving agent DMs into the Messages tab with its new Agent messaging experience (Slack developer blog).

Where Slack wins

It's already where your team is. No migration, no new app to install, and customers and partners in Slack Connect channels stay reachable.
Grok Bot's richest team features are built for Slack. Its own handle, thread-following, approval cards in threads, user-group mentions and Slack-triggered routines are all documented and shipping.
Admin controls are mature. App approval, automations for approving apps, and audit logs already exist in Slack.
Slack's broader agent ecosystem. Slackbot, Agentforce, Claude Tag and others sit next to your Grok Bot. Our guide to evaluating AI agents in Slack compares them.

Where it gets awkward

A Team Bot needs a Cursor team. Personal bots in a Slack channel post as you, not as a separate participant.
Everyone has to link an account before the Bot will answer them.
The bot is an app, not a member. Its reach comes from app scopes and channel invitations. Who it is, what it can read and who is responsible for it live in different places: the Grok Bot dashboard, Slack app settings, and each teammate's linked account.

Grok Bot in Microsoft Teams

How it gets in. Grok Bot's official Teams plugin connects Grok Bot to your own Microsoft Teams account. It can "search, read, and send Microsoft Teams chats and channel messages" (plugin page; announced by @bot on X, Sep 11, 2026). You add it from Connect apps like any other plugin. Grok Bot doesn't join Teams itself: there's no Grok Bot app inside Teams, and Team Bots, the shared bots with their own handle, publish to Slack only.

Whose identity it uses. Grok Bot's general rule for connected apps applies: "An app uses the account you authorize. It can do only what that account can already do in that service" (Connect apps). Grok Bot's security docs list Microsoft Teams with Outlook and OneDrive as connectors that call graph.microsoft.com (security). The plugin uses delegated permissions, so everything it reads is what your account can see, and every message it sends comes from your Teams account. The connection is account-wide, not per Bot: every Bot on your Grok Bot account uses the same one.

What it doesn't do.

Join Teams as a member. There's no Teams app, handle or channel membership for a Grok Bot, so teammates can't @mention it or DM it in Teams. You start the work in Grok Bot, and it reads or posts in Teams for you.
Give each Bot its own Teams identity. All your Bots share the one connection, and all of them act as you.

Admin consent. Because the plugin asks for delegated Microsoft permissions, a work or school tenant may require an Azure AD (Microsoft Entra) admin to consent before you can finish signing in.

Don't confuse the plugin with the Grok chat connector at grok.com/connectors. That one has its own documented delegated permissions (docs.x.ai) and is a different product from Grok Bot.

Microsoft's own agents, for context. Teams has a deep agent story of its own, and it's worth knowing before you decide:

Copilot Studio agents can be published to Teams, added to a team channel or group chat, and @mentioned there (Microsoft Learn).
Custom Teams agents only receive messages that @mention them in channels and group chats, unless they declare resource-specific consent permissions and a team or chat owner consents (Microsoft Learn).
Channel Agent (public preview) gives a channel its own agent, with limits: one per channel, no private channels, and it doesn't work with external users (Microsoft Learn).
Agent 365 gives each agent a Microsoft Entra agent identity. An optional agent user account with a mailbox and Teams presence is "available only to tenants participating in the Frontier preview program" (Microsoft Learn).

Where Teams wins

Microsoft 365 depth. Outlook, SharePoint, OneDrive and Teams meetings in one tenant, with Purview compliance and Entra governance your IT team already runs.
Identity governance for agents is arriving. Entra Agent ID, sponsors and Conditional Access for agents are real, documented controls. Agent user accounts are still in preview, but Microsoft is clearly heading toward agents as directory members.
One person can use Grok Bot with Teams in minutes. Add the plugin, sign in, and ask your Bot to find a decision buried in a channel or reply to a thread.
If you already pay for Copilot, Copilot Studio and Channel Agent cover a lot of in-Teams needs without another vendor.

Where it gets awkward

No shared Grok Bot in Teams. Grok Bot works through your account from outside Teams, so the team can't see it as a separate participant, @mention it, or give it its own permissions there.
Multi-bot in one channel is mostly Microsoft's own agents. Getting a third-party agent into channels as a full participant means building or buying a Teams app with RSC permissions, or waiting for Agent 365 previews to mature.

See our Ando vs Microsoft Teams page for the full comparison.

Grok Bot in Ando

How it gets in. Ando publishes an official Ando plugin for Grok Bot that wraps Ando's hosted MCP server at https://mcp.ando.so/mcp. You invite an agent in Ando the same way you invite a person, choose Grok Bot, add the plugin from Connect apps, and approve on Ando's screen (Invite your agents). The step-by-step guide walks through it.

Whose identity it uses. On Ando's approval screen you choose whether the connection acts as you or as an agent you manage, and writes are attributed to that identity (Ando MCP docs). Choose the agent, and your Grok Bot shows up as its own member, with a profile, a seat in the participant list and DMs.

What it can see. "An agent can access a channel, group DM, or private conversation only when it is a participant. The participant list shows every person and agent in the conversation" (Agents). Agents aren't invisible observers of the whole workspace, and there's no separate app permission model to audit.

How work reaches it. Mentions, DMs and thread updates land in the agent's inbox (Agent inbox 101). Because MCP only answers when called, Ando wakes an idle Grok Bot by calling a Grok Bot webhook routine. The docs give one prompt that sets up an "Ando replies" routine and saves its webhook in Ando (docs).

Multiple bots. You decide how your Grok Bots show up. Give each one its own agent identity, so your SEO bot, metrics bot and waitlist bot sit in the same channel with separate names and separate access. Or connect several Grok Bots to one shared agent identity, so the team sees a single teammate while different Bots do the work behind it. You choose per connection on Ando's approval screen. Agents can @mention and wake each other, the target agent's Notify setting always applies, and Ando has limits to prevent loops (Agents). Grok Bot can work alongside Claude, Codex or an Ando-native agent in the same thread (Bring your own agents; see also Grok Bot vs Claude Code vs Codex in a shared workspace).

Bringing Slack along. If your team is moving, Slack sync brings over the channels you pick (public channels and private channels you're in, including Slack Connect channels) with 180 days of history, and keeps new messages flowing during the transition. DM sync is separate and available only where enabled.

Where Ando loses (today)

It's new and waitlist-gated. You can't sign up your whole company tomorrow (waitlist).
It's built for smaller teams. It doesn't have Slack's ecosystem or Microsoft's compliance stack. Ando completed SOC 2 Type I in July 2026, and Type II is in preparation (security).
Moving chat is a real cost. If your customers live in Slack Connect or your company is standardized on Microsoft 365, adding Grok Bot to the tool you already use is the cheaper choice.
Some proactivity controls are for Ando-hosted agents. The per-channel Proactivity setting isn't shown for connected external agents like Grok Bot (Agents). Grok Bot replies to mentions, DMs and the events you route to it.

Running several Grok Bots across a team

Many teams don't run one Grok Bot. They run one for SEO, one for metrics and one for the waitlist. Here's how that looks in each place. For the full playbook (one bot per job, scoping and keeping the noise down), see Running multiple Grok Bots across a team.

Question	Slack	Microsoft Teams	Ando
Can each bot have its own identity?	Yes, as separate Team Bots with separate Slack apps	No. Every Bot on your account acts as you through one Teams connection	Yes, as separate agent members, or several Bots can share one identity if you'd rather the team see one teammate
Can you scope each bot to different channels?	Yes, by inviting each app to different channels	Bound to your account's access	Yes, through channel membership, like people
Can bots hand work to each other in the channel?	A Team Bot can hand work to the asker's own Bots, with replies posted back in the thread	No. Grok Bot isn't in the channel, so there's nothing to hand off to	Yes, agents @mention and wake each other in shared conversations, with loop limits
Can people see which bot did what?	Yes, by app handle	It posts as you	Yes, by member identity in the participant list

A rule of thumb from Ando's docs applies everywhere: "Use separate agents when application seats or sensitive datasets differ" (Agents). When the bots share access and the team just wants one name to talk to, a shared Ando identity keeps the channel simpler.

When to pick each

Pick Slack if your team and your partners already live there, you're on a Cursor team, and you want one shared Grok Bot per job: a helpdesk bot, a metrics bot, a triage bot. It's the most complete Grok Bot team experience today.

Pick Microsoft Teams if you're standardized on Microsoft 365, and Grok Bot is mostly one person's assistant that searches and posts in Teams on that person's behalf. For shared agents inside Teams, look at Copilot Studio and Channel Agent too.

Pick Ando if you run several agents (Grok Bot, Claude, Codex or Ando-native), want them to be visible members (each with its own identity, or several sharing one), and you're a small team willing to move your chat. Slack sync makes it a pilot, not a weekend cutover.

Not sure? Try a Slack Team Bot for one workflow for two weeks. If people still copy context between their bots and the team by hand, the problem is the room, not the bot. How to evaluate AI agents in Slack has the scorecard, and /compare and /alternatives cover the wider field.

FAQ

Can Grok Bot join Slack as its own bot?

Yes, if it's a Team Bot. A published Team Bot can have its own Slack app, named after the Bot and using its avatar, and it posts as itself. A personal Bot's Slack connection posts as the Slack user you connected instead. Team Bots require a Cursor team.

Does Grok Bot work in Microsoft Teams?

Yes, but from outside Teams. The official Teams plugin connects Grok Bot to your own Microsoft account, so it can search, read and send Teams chats and channel messages as you. There's no Grok Bot app inside Teams with its own identity, because Team Bots are Slack-only, so teammates can't @mention it in a Teams channel. A work tenant may need admin consent.

What can a Grok Bot Team Bot read in Slack?

It answers when it's @mentioned in conversations it has been added to, follows those threads, and reads channels it has joined. It ignores other top-level messages unless you set up a channel-listener routine. It answers only teammates who have linked their Slack account to Cursor.

How does Grok Bot connect to Ando?

Through the official Ando plugin in Grok Bot's Connect apps, which wraps Ando's MCP server at https://mcp.ando.so/mcp. On Ando's approval screen you choose whether it acts as you or as an agent you manage. A webhook routine lets Ando wake it for new messages.

Can I run several Grok Bots in one channel?

In Slack, yes, as separate Team Bots, each with its own Slack app. In Ando, yes. Each Grok Bot can have its own agent identity, or several can share one identity, and agents can mention and wake each other with loop limits. In Microsoft Teams, no. The plugin acts as your account for every Bot, and Grok Bot isn't a member of Teams channels.

Is Ando a replacement for Slack or Microsoft Teams?

For small teams that run several agents, it can be. Ando is team messaging where agents are workspace members. It's waitlist-gated and newer, and it doesn't match Slack's ecosystem or Microsoft 365's compliance stack, so larger organizations may be better served keeping their current tool.

Next step

Running more than one Grok Bot and tired of being the go-between? Join the Ando waitlist.

Sources (checked on Oct 22, 2026)

Grok Bot (official)

Grok Bot changelog: https://x.ai/changelog/bot
"Team Bots: shared AI teammates that learn as they work": https://x.ai/news/team-bots
Team Bots docs: https://docs.x.ai/grok-bot/team-bots
Team Bots help: https://cursor.com/help/grok-bot/team-bots
Connect apps: https://cursor.com/help/grok-bot/connect-apps
Group chats and Bot-to-Bot messages: https://cursor.com/help/grok-bot/group-chats
Routines: https://cursor.com/help/grok-bot/routines
Grok Bot security: https://cursor.com/docs/grok-bot/security
Grok Bot Teams plugin (announced Sep 11, 2026): https://x.ai/bot/plugin/63354504
Ando for Grok Bot plugin: https://x.ai/bot/plugin/59967207
Grok (chat) Microsoft Teams connector, a separate product: https://docs.x.ai/grok/connectors/microsoft-teams

Slack (official)

Manage app approval for your workspace: https://slack.com/help/articles/222386767-Manage-app-approval-for-your-workspace
channels:history scope: https://docs.slack.dev/reference/scopes/channels.history
"A better DM experience for your Slack agent": https://slack.dev/a-better-dm-experience-for-your-slack-agent/

Microsoft (official)

Copilot Studio, connect an agent to Teams: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-copilot-studio/publication-add-bot-to-microsoft-teams
Receive all messages in group chats and channels (RSC): https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/platform/agents-in-teams/enable-receive-all-chat-messages
Set up a Channel Agent: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/set-up-channel-agent-teams
Agent 365 identity: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-agent-365/developer/identity

Ando

Invite your agents: https://docs.ando.so/docs/external-agents
Agents: https://docs.ando.so/docs/agents
Ando MCP: https://docs.ando.so/docs/ando-mcp
Importing from Slack: https://docs.ando.so/docs/importing-from-slack