How to join and test a Microsoft Teams interview

To test a Microsoft Teams interview, open the Teams app, then Settings, then Devices, then Make a test call. A bot records a short clip and plays it back so you can confirm your camera and mic work. Do it the day before, join five minutes early, and save the phone dial-in number as a backup.

Teams is the default for a lot of companies, which means a lot of interviews happen on it whether or not the candidate has used it much. The good news is that Teams is not the hard part of your interview. The questions are the same ones you would get in a room or on any other platform. What Teams adds is a short set of join-and-setup quirks, and almost all of them are solved before the call starts. This page walks the test call, the browser-versus-app choice, the meeting-ID flow, and the phone backup.

It works for both kinds of Teams interview. A live call, where a person is on the other end, and the less common recorded setup, a one-way interview where you answer set questions on your own with no interviewer present. The setup steps below are identical for both. If your invite turns out to be the recorded kind, the asynchronous video interview guide covers how that format works end to end.

Run a test call first

This is the single most useful thing Teams gives you, and most candidates never find it. The test call is a built-in check that records a few seconds of you and plays it straight back, so you hear your own audio and see your own video the way the interviewer will.

1. Open the Teams desktop app and sign in. The test call lives in the full app, not the browser version, so this step assumes you can install it. If you cannot, skip to the browser section below and use the pre-join screen instead.
2. Click your profile picture at the top right, then Settings. This opens the main settings panel.
3. Choose Devices. You will see dropdowns for your speaker, microphone, and camera, plus a live camera preview.
4. Confirm the right devices are selected. Pick your real webcam and microphone if a worse built-in option is chosen by default. Laptops often default to a tinny internal mic.
5. Click Make a test call. A recorded bot asks you to say a few words after the tone, records them, and plays them back. You are listening for clear audio with no echo, and watching for a lit, well-framed face.

If the playback sounds muddy or your face is dark, you have just caught the problem with time to fix it. That is the whole point of doing this the day before rather than during the first two minutes of the interview. For a deeper setup pass on lighting and framing, see lighting and camera setup.

Choose the app or the browser

When you click a Teams meeting link, you are usually offered two ways in: open the desktop app, or continue in your web browser. Both work. They are not quite equal.

The desktop app is the more stable choice. It handles weak connections better, keeps the full Settings and Devices menu, and is less likely to drop than a browser tab. If you can install it, do that a day ahead, sign in, and let any update finish. A surprise update is a classic way to lose your first five minutes.

The browser option, Continue on this browser, runs the interview in your web browser with no install at all. That is the right call when you are on a work laptop or a shared machine where you cannot add software, or when the app simply will not cooperate. Teams on the web works in Chrome, Edge, Firefox, and Safari, but Chrome and Edge tend to be the most reliable for camera and mic, so reach for one of those if you have the choice. When the browser asks for camera and microphone permission, click Allow. A blocked permission is the most common reason a browser join shows a black screen or silent mic.

Either way, settle this the day before. Click the link early, see which option you are going to use, and make sure that path works. Do not discover at the start of the interview that your browser is blocking the camera.

Work the meeting-ID and lobby flow

Most Teams invites are a single Join the meeting now link, and clicking it is all you need. Some, though, give you a meeting ID and a passcode instead, or in addition. Both routes exist, and it helps to know which one you have before the day.

If you have a link, click it a few minutes early. If you only have a meeting ID and passcode, open Teams, look for Join with an ID, and enter them there. Either way you will usually land on a pre-join screen first, where you can set your name, toggle your camera and mic, and pick or blur your background before anyone sees you. Use that screen. It is your last private check.

After the pre-join screen you may sit in a lobby, a short holding state, until the interviewer admits you. This is normal and not a sign anything is wrong. Waiting a minute in the lobby is expected, so do not refresh or rejoin in a panic. While you wait, confirm your camera is on, your mic is unmuted, and your background is what you want it to be.

One Teams-specific habit is worth naming. On a live Teams call, keep your camera on unless told otherwise, and look at the camera lens rather than the face on screen. Reading is easy to spot on camera, because your eyes track sideways across the text. So keep a few notes beside the lens if they steady you, but not a full script your eyes follow across the screen. More on where to look during a video interview.

Keep the phone dial-in as backup

This is the safety net that turns a technical failure into a thirty-second blip. Many Teams invites include a phone number and a numeric conference ID, usually under a heading like Or call in (audio only), near the join link. That dial-in is a real way into the same meeting.

Before the interview, scroll the invite and check whether a dial-in number is there. If it is, save it and the conference ID somewhere you can reach without your laptop, a note on your phone is ideal. Then, if your camera freezes, your connection drops, or the app simply will not load, you dial that number, enter the conference ID when prompted, and you are in by audio while you sort the video out. It is far better to keep talking on the phone than to vanish from the call entirely.

Two honest caveats. Not every meeting has dial-in enabled, so this only works if the number is actually in your invite. And audio-only is a fallback, not the plan, since most interviewers expect to see you. If you do have to switch to phone, say so plainly: “my video dropped, I have dialled in by phone while I reconnect.” Composure under a small hiccup reads well on its own. For the full recovery playbook, see what to do when your internet drops.

A short pre-call checklist

The steps above are the day-before work. Right before the interview, run the quick version.

• App or browser decided, link or meeting ID tested, and you are signed in.
• Test call passed, or the pre-join screen confirms camera and mic in the browser.
• Camera at eye level, face lit from the front, background plain or blurred.
• Phone dial-in number and conference ID saved somewhere off the laptop.
• Notifications silenced, water and a few notes in reach.
• Joined five to ten minutes early, waiting calmly in the lobby.

Settle Teams once, properly, and it stops being the thing you are worried about. Then it is just an interview, on the platform your employer happens to use.

If your interview is on a different platform, the same logic carries over: Zoom interview tips and the Google Meet interview guide walk their own test-and-join quirks. And if it turns out to be a recorded, one-way format with no live interviewer, read what an asynchronous video interview is and how to prepare for a virtual interview for the setup that carries the most weight.