Slack for Windows – release notes

Slack 4.21.0

20 October 2021

Security guidance

This release includes minor security improvements. Updating is beneficial.

Slack 4.20.0

20 September 2021

What’s new

When opening SSH, FTP, SFTP or SMB links, you’ll now see the option to allow all future URLs from just that same domain instead of the whole wide world. A little more secure for us, a little more peace of mind for you.

Bug fixes

Certain versions of the app were not correctly changing availability to “Away” after 10 minutes of inactivity. While this has been fixed, we’d like to remind you that you can use your Custom Status to let your teammates know your whereabouts beyond simply Active or Away. Examples include: walking the dog, catching up after PTO, taking a mental break, or tweeting nice things to the Slack social media team.

Security guidance

This release includes security improvements. Updating is recommended.

Slack 4.19.3

25 August 2021

Bug fixes

We tweaked some things too small to notice or too difficult to explain. We’ll return you to your regular, more interesting types of release next time (we hope).

Slack 4.19.2

18 August 2021

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.19.0

11 August 2021

Bug fixes

If you had the “Launch app on login” preference selected, we stopped showing a checkmark next to it after the app restarted. Strong systems require checks and balances, and we’re pleased to report ours now has one more check.
Did you know that pressing the Esc key will mark the channel you’re viewing as read? Or that pressing Shift + Esc will clear ALL of your notifications? Well, now you can do that without being pulled out of fullscreen mode. See our full list of nifty keyboard shortcuts by pressing Ctrl + / the next time you have Slack open!

Security guidance

This release includes significant security improvements. Updating is strongly recommended.

Slack 4.18.0

14 July 2021

Bug fixes

If you moved the app window between multiple monitors, notifications were slow to appear on the correct screen. After some orange slices and a halftime pep talk, notifications will be sticking with the app wherever it may go.
Certain menus were not being properly translated when switching languages in the app. You know what they say about menus — they’re most helpful when you can read them.

Slack 4.17.1

4 June 2021

Bug fixes

Some folks using the newest generation of processors were experiencing the app crashing. Crashes are no fun, particularly when they involve shiny new things, so this has been fixed.

Slack 4.17.0

3 June 2021

What’s new

Bigger is better, or rather, closer is clearer. We now support additional zoom levels up to 200% to reduce the strain on your precious peepers.

Bug fixes

Previously, you may have expected the “Launch on Login” option to do precisely that when clicked. But sadly it didn’t. Pre-flight checks have been rerun, and we are prepared to initiate countdown once more.
You can no longer select incoming notifications as a shareable screen when on a Slack Call. To anyone who noticed this was even possible before, we salute your fastidiousness.

Security guidance

This release includes security improvements. Updating is recommended.

Slack 4.16.1

6 May 2021

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.16.0

4 May 2021

Bug fixes

Images and notifications were sometimes sharing real estate...inelegantly. We have given them both a talking-to, and they have agreed to joint custody of that section of the screen.

Security guidance

This release includes security improvements. Updating is recommended.

Slack 4.15.0

12 April 2021

Bug fixes

Previously, clicking on a notification in Windows Action Center didn’t bring you to the message in Slack — basically the opposite of walking into a room and forgetting what you came for, but no less confusing.
Sometimes when the Windows app was launching, it instead decided to hit the Snooze button and just hang there for a while. We gave it a polite talking-to, and it will now be more punctual.

Security guidance

This release includes minor security improvements. Updating is beneficial.

Slack 4.14.0

17 March 2021

Bug fixes

We improved the restart experience when you’ve gone offline or are having loading issues.
We all have to sign out sometimes. If you sign out of all of your workspaces, you should have an easier time signing back in.
Hopefully you’ll be able to ask “Can you see my screen?” a little less these days. The green border that lets you know you’re screen sharing is back.

Security guidance

This release includes minor security improvements. Updating is beneficial.

Slack 4.13.0

16 February 2021

Bug fixes

When you move or resize Slack, we assume that you are indeed trying to move or resize it – and so the crash that was regularly happening, instead, was unwelcome. We’ve fixed this. Here’s to properly-sized screens!
We’ve fixed several accessibility issues. Making Slack more accessible is a continuous journey, and we’re quite grateful that you’re along for the ride!

Slack 4.12.2

8 January 2021

Bug fixes

We tweaked some things too small to notice or too difficult to explain. We’ll return you to your regular, more interesting types of release next time (we hope).

Slack 4.12.1

7 January 2021

Bug fixes

We’ve tuned the engine and given the interior a thorough clean. Everything is now running smoothly again.

Slack 4.12.0

14 December 2020

What’s new

È pronto! Italian language support has landed!
You can now attach recently used files – in one click – from the paperclip menu. Hasty screenshotters, the world is yours.

Bug fixes

Some small, but important, accessibility improvements for those navigating with VoiceOver or a screen reader.
As a dancer gracefully recovers from a minor tumble, so shall our app gracefully reload whilst throttled by network failures.
Repeat after me: the app window will not change size after clicking a notification.

Slack 4.11.3

25 November 2020

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.11.1

11 November 2020

Bug fixes

We tweaked some things too small to notice or too difficult to explain. We’ll return you to your regular, more interesting types of release next time (we hope).

Slack 4.11.0

9 November 2020

Bug fixes

We’ve tuned the engine and given the interior a thorough clean. Everything is now running smoothly again.

Slack 4.10.3

15 October 2020

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.10.0

6 October 2020

Bug fixes

Sometimes, you could not exit full screen mode with escape on windows, which was wrong, because that’s literally what escape means. Now, it works.
We fixed some issues that caused window resizing of Slack to be difficult. We never want to be difficult.
Quickly switching workspaces caused problems. Switching workspaces should only cause opportunities, so we fixed that.
There were a few little bugs that caused crashes, like bugs do. We fixed those, and we’ll fix the next ones too.

Slack 4.9.0

2 September 2020

Bug fixes

We’ve tuned the engine and given the interior a thorough clean. Everything is now running smoothly again.

Slack 4.8.0

23 July 2020

Bug fixes

Sometimes after an update, the Slack icon would disappear from the system tray. We got some stronger glue, so it should now stay put.
In rare cases, Slack would simply fail to start altogether. While we’re sure we could all use a coffee break, we know you could also use an application that runs. So we fixed that.
We made the screen you see when you have connection problems more useful. We also spruced it up a bit with a fresh coat of paint.
Our notifications system sprung a leak, so we brought it in for a tune-up. Everything should be running smoother now.

Slack 4.7.0

2 July 2020

What’s new

We’ve upgraded all the backend stuff that the apps run on, resulting in better performance and fewer bugs.

Slack 4.6.0

21 May 2020

What’s new

Batten the hatches! The app sandbox is now enabled for all web content. This is a fancy way of saying we’ve dialed up the security of the app. It wasn’t unsafe before, but it’s double safe now.
A preference that allows you to choose a unique save location per download, instead of choosing a folder for all of them. For the choosy types.

Bug fixes

Your notifications should be tidily grouped by workspace when shown in the Action Center.
A tricky case where some users were unable to get to the browser to add their first workspace.
The Launch on login preference showing the wrong value, when the app was installed from the MSI package.
If you found yourself, in some distant past, trying to start a song on Spotify with your keyboard’s play button, and it did not respond to your command while Slack was front and center, pesky hardware media keys were the problem. And this version is the cure.
The app should be less spicy to your CPU when you’re viewing certain network error pages.
When a download completes, we’ll show an in-app prompt rather than a bothersome system notification.

Slack 4.5.1

11 May 2020

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.5.0

21 April 2020

What’s new

We’ve upgraded all the backend stuff that the apps run on, resulting in better performance and fewer bugs.
Our spellchecker has been swapped out for a newer model that’s faster, leaner and capable of fixing your typos in… wait, surely not? “Multiple languages at the same time”! Open the “Language & region” preferences to choose your languages. And for whoever it is out there requires that functionality: our hats off to you. We can barely type in one language right now.

Slack 4.4.2

31 March 2020

Bug fixes

We're always working on performance improvements – and this release repairs a previously broken performance diagnostic tool. You won't notice the difference, but we'll have an easier time improving Slack.

Slack 4.4.0

18 March 2020

Bug fixes

Fixed: Windows Action Centre notifications were unable to display certain characters, such as < or ‘.
Fixed: Switching notification types on Windows would cause both types of notifications to be shown until the app was restarted.
Fixed: On Windows, if users landed on our error page, the main menu wasn’t available, which was an error in itself. The error on the error page is now de-errored.
Fixed: If you zoomed right in or zoomed right out and then opened the About Slack window, the About Slack window would also be zoomed right in/out, which was a little intense.
Fixed: Once in a while, users would receive a flood of notifications for old messages. This was not a bad case of déjà vu, it was a bug. And now, a fixed one.

Slack 4.3.4

10 February 2020

Bug fixes

A more intuitive error page for the unfortunate situation when Slack cannot connect to the internet.

Slack 4.3.2

21 January 2020

What’s new

We've tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Bug fixes

Slack would sometimes crash when the user right-clicked to see the context menu. In context, that was unhelpful. So it no longer does that.
When maximized, the app had developed a bit of a distracting flicker. That flicker is now part of Slack history.
Occasionally, a restart would result in connectivity issues for Slack… now you should be back online and back to work lickety-split.

Slack 4.3.0

16 December 2019

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.2.0

26 November 2019

What’s new

Our newest, fastest, best-performing, shiniest, most nutritious and delicious version of Slack is now fully rolled out, so that’s the one you’re now using!
Like zooming in and out? Use a number pad? Great news! You can now do these things, on that.

Bug fixes

Notifications looked weird if your workspace name was long. Now, no matter what your team name is, notifications look lovely.
Some messages were being marked as read when Slack was hidden behind applications, or not visible on screen. Now we won’t mark it as read until you’ve actually seen it. Which seems fair.

Slack 4.1.2

18 October 2019

What’s new

We added support for Windows 10 Focus Assist priority list. So now our built-in and Action Center notifications will respect your Focus Assist settings, staying as quiet (or as loud) as you want them to be.
A new menu for the system tray lets you take control of how and when Slack launches when you boot up (even, randomly, if you are not signed in to any teams.)

Bug fixes

Receiving a gif in a notification could mess with your notifications.
Long workspace names now no longer appear as incredibly long in menus.
Slack menus should now be showing up in the right language (meaning the one that is right for you).
Spellchecker stopped working for a small number of users, leading to a shorp increase in avoidabull erraz. With spellcheck now fully back online for those users, any remaining typos are officially not our fault.
There was a slim chance things weren’t finishing up properly when closing Slack. We’re working on making all this perfect but in the meantime it is better, at least. Restarting when clearing cache now works again.
You no longer have to ask “Update.exe? What IS that?” – we now show up with our actual name (which is “Slack”, by the way) in Startup entries for Task Manager and Settings.
Slack could go into a state where getting notifications (even if you couldn't see them) would prevent you from clicking on the right side of your monitor… at all. Sorry for any understandable frustration this caused — your notifications (and your ability to use your mouse) are now working as intended again.

Slack 4.1.1

8 October 2019

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.1.0

1 October 2019

What’s new

Thanks to a few tweaks to the engine, a polish of the pistons, and recalibrated valves, the app should be running smoother and faster, than before.
Spellcheck, revamped, is now a much better version of its old self (and back on Linux, to boot) — now it supports Greek, Portuguese and British English. So now spelling correctly should come more naturally to us all (which is good, because “correctly” can be a difacult word to spell).

Bug fixes

For a quicker connection, and less frustration, checking for network connectivity is more reliable than it was before.
After uploading a video into Slack some found it would give an infinite circle of loading, but not play, which was never our plan. Now: it works! It plays; no more circle! Because, it turned out, all circ and no play made Slack a null ‘ploy.

Slack 4.0.2

19 August 2019

Bug fixes

Videos in channels were found to be the cause of a minor (but annoying) memory leak that has now been well and truly plugged.
It’s taken a few attempts, but the app should now crash less often when connected to an external display. Hopefully.
When opening your computer, the app is now, thankfully, more likely to launch properly every time. And, if you’re using the direct download version, you can choose whether it’s launched in the background or on screen.
We’ve spruced up the notifications a little so now they’ll not only appear every time you need them to, they’ll also appear in whatever theme you’ve proudly decked your sidebar out in. Not too shabby.
Now whenever an app update is available, we’ll send you a polite little notification alerting you to the fact.
If opening Slack from a shortcut on your desktop or menu had become a thing of habit, you’ll know that we broke it recently. We’re really sorry. It works again now.
When you’re using Focus Assist in Windows, we’ll now assist that focus even more by no longer sending you distracting notifications. Sorry about that.
Using the alt key to move focus to the menu is a great feature… but it could get a bit over-excitable. If you press it by accident (or otherwise), it will no longer take ALL the focus, and you can continue to do other things.

Slack 4.0.1

25 July 2019

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 4.0.0

8 July 2019

What’s new

Slack is now a tiny bit faster all around, thanks to a bunch of little changes that each made a difference for the better.

Bug fixes

Dragging and dropping files into Slack is now much more stable.
If you ever do need to reset the app’s data, this now works better. A bit better, at least.
We’ve improved the alignment of team icons in the sidebar for people in lots of workspaces. It’s a small thing, but much more aesthetically pleasing.
Hardware acceleration can now be turned off without foregrounding Slack. If you know what that means, then you know it’s handy. If you don’t – it still is! Best to carry on reading.

Slack 3.4.3

6 June 2019

Bug fixes

The app was crashing more often than it should have done upon waking. Waking up is hard for all of us, but it shouldn’t have been that hard. It now crashes less often than it did – in the meantime we’re still working towards making that “not at all”.

Slack 3.4.2

23 May 2019

What’s new

Just as day follows night and winter gives way to spring, so have we updated Electron to 4.2.1.

Bug fixes

Tweaked the way that push notifications work between desktop and mobile to make them (hopefully) better for everyone. And faster.
Some minor tweaks to the stability of the app (to make it more stable, to be clear).

Slack 3.4.1

3 May 2019

Bug fixes

We’ve tinkered with the internal workings and polished some rough edges. The app is now better than it was.

Slack 3.4.0

18 April 2019

Bug fixes

Interactions with network drives are now handled with grace and panache. Or at the very least, “better”.
If you want to launch Slack minimised, you now can. We will no longer stand in your way.
We’ve changed the look, feel and texture of our new HTML notifications. Give them a try! They’re gorgeous.
Sometimes in Windows 10, moving the window up, for example, would cause a white bar to appear. We’ve raised the bar.
Also, moving the window would sometimes change its size. You knew what you wanted, so we’ve stopped interfering.
In the Apps and Features and Uninstall a Program window, the icon displayed was not the right one. It now is.
The notification and unread indicators on the taskbar are now more readable.
Blurry icons were an issue for some users with multiple displays. All is clear now.
The Slack icon, previously appearing with an opaque background colour in Windows 10, is now all the clearer for being less clear.
Some people were seeing sidebar icons for teams other than the one they were in. This was confusing, and has now been fixed.
And finally, if you have been having keyboard or cursor issues, you should no longer be having them.

Slack 3.3.8

7 March 2019

What’s new

When you sign in, you’ll now do it via your browser rather than in the app.

Bug fixes

We’ve fixed the tray icon to make the notification badge easier to see, because let’s face it, if you can’t see a notification, it’s not really doing its job.
Switching from one channel to another will now give the correct name and information of the new one, rather than the old one, as was previously the case.
The new loading animation was a little stretched, or a little squished, depending on how you looked at it. It’s practically perfect now.
A few icons in menus went missing in Windows 10, but these have now been retrieved.
Occasionally, the “Open the Slack app” browser button would not open the workspace in the desktop app. Silly, really. It does now.
If you use SSO (single sign-on) to log in, it should now work perfectly every time.