How to Uninstall Microsoft Teams From Your Mac (Both Versions)

Microsoft has been running two versions of Teams on Mac for over a year — “classic” Teams (the original Electron app) and “new” Teams (a rewrite using WebView2-style architecture). They have different bundle IDs, different storage locations, and different uninstall procedures. If you used both, you have two messes to clean up.

I helped a colleague uninstall Teams last month and we found 3.1 GB of leftover data across both versions, even though they thought classic Teams was already gone. Here’s how to remove either or both, properly, on macOS Sonoma 14 and Sequoia 15.

Identify which version(s) you have

Open Finder → Applications. You’re looking for two distinct apps:

• “Microsoft Teams classic” or just “Microsoft Teams” (older builds) — bundle ID com.microsoft.teams
• “Microsoft Teams” with the newer icon — bundle ID com.microsoft.teams2

If both are present, uninstall both. If you only have classic, you might want to keep it for now if it’s still working — Microsoft has been deprecating it gradually.

Quit Teams completely

Teams doesn’t quit cleanly from the X button — closing the window leaves Teams running in the background to receive notifications.

1. From the menu bar, click “Microsoft Teams” → Quit, or press Cmd+Q with Teams focused.
2. Open Activity Monitor.
3. Search “Teams.” Force-quit any remaining processes.

You’ll typically see one or two Teams Helper processes alongside the main app. The new Teams also runs a com.microsoft.teams2 helper.

Uninstall classic Teams

Drag “Microsoft Teams classic” (or “Microsoft Teams” if it’s the older app) from Applications to the Trash. Then clear these folders:

• ~/Library/Application Support/Microsoft/Teams/ — message cache, profile data
• ~/Library/Application Support/com.microsoft.teams/ — additional support data
• ~/Library/Caches/com.microsoft.teams/ — image cache, GPU cache
• ~/Library/Caches/com.microsoft.teamshelper/ — helper process cache
• ~/Library/Preferences/com.microsoft.teams.plist — preferences
• ~/Library/Saved Application State/com.microsoft.teams.savedState/ — window state
• ~/Library/Cookies/com.microsoft.teams.binarycookies — cookies
• ~/Library/Logs/Microsoft Teams Helper (Renderer)/ — diagnostic logs
• ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.microsoft.teams/ — modern web storage
• ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.microsoft.teams.binarycookies — legacy cookie storage

Use Finder → Shift+Cmd+G → paste each path. The Application Support folder is usually the largest, often 1–2 GB on a heavily-used install.

Uninstall new Teams

The new Teams uses bundle ID com.microsoft.teams2. Drag “Microsoft Teams” to the Trash, then clear:

• ~/Library/Application Support/com.microsoft.teams2/ — main data folder for the new app
• ~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.teams2/ — sandbox container (new Teams is partially sandboxed)
• ~/Library/Group Containers/UBF8T346G9.com.microsoft.teams/ — shared with other Microsoft apps; only delete if you’re removing all Microsoft apps
• ~/Library/Caches/com.microsoft.teams2/ — image and font cache
• ~/Library/Preferences/com.microsoft.teams2.plist — preferences
• ~/Library/Saved Application State/com.microsoft.teams2.savedState/ — window state
• ~/Library/Cookies/com.microsoft.teams2.binarycookies — cookies
• ~/Library/HTTPStorages/com.microsoft.teams2/ — modern web storage
• ~/Library/Logs/com.microsoft.teams2/ — diagnostic logs
• ~/Library/WebKit/com.microsoft.teams2/ — WebKit data (new Teams uses WebKit, not Chromium)

The Group Containers folder is the tricky one. UBF8T346G9.com.microsoft.teams is shared between Teams, Outlook for Mac, OneNote, and other Microsoft apps. If you only use Teams from this list, you can delete it. If you also use Outlook or other Office apps, leave it alone — they may have data there too.

Let Sweep uninstall properlyDrag-to-trash leaves traces. Sweep wipes the app + support files + prefs + caches + helpers all at once. Get Sweep free →

Microsoft AutoUpdate

Both Teams versions use Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) to check for new versions. MAU is shared with Office, OneDrive, and other Microsoft apps — don’t remove it unless you’re removing all Microsoft software from this Mac.

To check what MAU is managing:

ls ~/Library/Preferences/ | grep -i microsoft
ls /Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/MAU2.0/

If Microsoft Teams is the only Microsoft app you have installed and you want to fully clean up:

sudo rm -rf /Library/Application\ Support/Microsoft/MAU2.0
sudo rm -rf "/Library/Application Support/Microsoft AutoUpdate"

Skip this entirely if you have Word, Excel, Outlook, or OneDrive installed.

Login items and background

1. System Settings → General → Login Items & Extensions.
2. Look for both Teams entries under “Open at Login” and “Allow in the Background.”
3. Click minus or toggle off to remove.

If you don’t see them listed, they’re already gone. The login item entries can survive a few reboots after uninstall before macOS cleans them up.

There’s a faster waySweep does the same hunt in seconds, with a preview before anything is removed. Try Sweep free →

Keychain entries

Both Teams versions store SSO tokens, ADAL refresh tokens, and meeting credentials in the Keychain. Search Keychain Access for:

• “Microsoft Teams”
• “MicrosoftAppV3”
• “com.microsoft.adalcache”
• “com.microsoft.identity.universalstorage”

Be careful with the last two — they’re shared with Outlook, OneDrive, and other Microsoft 365 apps. If you only use Teams, remove them. If you use other Microsoft apps, signing out of Teams from inside the app before uninstalling is the safer way (it removes only the Teams-specific tokens).

Privacy permissions

Teams asks for camera, microphone, screen recording, and accessibility access. Clean these up:

1. System Settings → Privacy & Security.
2. Camera, Microphone, Screen Recording, Accessibility — check each list.
3. Remove any Teams entries.

These entries don’t grant any access once the app is gone, but tidying them up keeps your privacy panel readable.

Empty the Trash and verify

Empty the Trash. Then verify Teams is fully gone:

ls ~/Library/Application\ Support/ | grep -i teams
ls ~/Library/Caches/ | grep -i teams
ls ~/Library/Preferences/ | grep -i teams

If all three return empty, you’re clean. If something still shows up, it’s most likely a folder you missed in the lists above.

Why Sweep is faster here

Teams is honestly one of the worst Mac apps to uninstall manually because there are TWO versions, both with multiple bundle IDs, and shared Group Containers that you have to be careful about. Sweep’s uninstaller knows the difference between Teams classic, new Teams, and the shared Microsoft frameworks — it’ll target Teams-specific files and leave the shared ones alone unless you also tell it to remove other Microsoft apps.

Behind the scenes Sweep is doing what we did manually above, but with full visibility — you see every file before anything is touched, and the size total at the end of the scan is usually a wake-up call (3+ GB is normal).

Reinstalling new Teams cleanly

If you’re uninstalling Teams just to fix sign-in problems or sync issues — which is half the reason people uninstall it — clearing all the Application Support and Caches folders and reinstalling fresh from microsoft.com/teams almost always works. The corruption is usually in IndexedDB inside the support folder, and a clean install rebuilds it.

After reinstall, you’ll need to sign in once, but your chats, channels, and files all live server-side in the Microsoft cloud. Your local data is just a cache.

That’s both versions of Teams, fully removed. Time to restart and see how much faster the boot feels — Teams classic alone added 4 seconds to my login on a 2020 Intel MacBook Pro.