Clear the Microsoft Teams Client Cache

Microsoft Teams cache behaviour is a lot to be desired if I am honest. One thing for sure is that if you are deploying Teams you’ll quickly find that your admin controlled policy settings take a random amount of time to come into effect on the target machines.

Unlike Skype for Business Online where in-band policy changes took longest 30 minutes, with Teams we can be waiting days, and I mean that literally.

Upon talking with support the standard response is that it can take anything from 30 minutes to 3 days for policies to become effective. To me, this is unacceptable and Microsoft have acknowledged that at least. Hopefully we will see some improvements soon.

The problem though really centers around the client cache. So clearing the cache is the first step to troubleshooting. The trouble is, the cache for Teams isn’t in one place or even a single directory. It’s split in multiple directories and even Internet Explorer and Chrome cache locations. So when support as you to clear the cache, there are something like 13 different places you need to go in order to clean the machine.

These locations are:

• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\application cache\cache
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\blob_storage
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\databases
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\cache
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\gpucache
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\Indexeddb
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\Local Storage
• %AppData%\Microsoft\teams\tmp
• %LocalAppData%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache
• %LocalAppData%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cookies
• %LocalAppData%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Web Data
• Internet Explorer Temporary Internet Files
• Internet Explorer Cookies

Only after clearing these locations is it considered a clean start for the Teams app. Through pain of trial I have now given up and made a PowerShell script to do this for me, shared below.

$challenge = Read-Host "Are you sure you want to delete Teams Cache (Y/N)?"
$challenge = $challenge.ToUpper()
if ($challenge -eq "N"){
Stop-Process -Id $PID
}elseif ($challenge -eq "Y"){
Write-Host "Stopping Teams Process" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
Get-Process -ProcessName Teams | Stop-Process -Force
Start-Sleep -Seconds 3
Write-Host "Teams Process Sucessfully Stopped" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Clearing Teams Disk Cache" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\application cache\cache" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\blob_storage" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\databases" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\cache" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\gpucache" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\Indexeddb" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\Local Storage" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:APPDATA\"Microsoft\teams\tmp" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Write-Host "Teams Disk Cache Cleaned" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Stopping Chrome Process" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
Get-Process -ProcessName Chrome| Stop-Process -Force
Start-Sleep -Seconds 3
Write-Host "Chrome Process Sucessfully Stopped" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Clearing Chrome Cache" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:LOCALAPPDATA"\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cache" | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:LOCALAPPDATA"\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Cookies" -File | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Get-ChildItem -Path $env:LOCALAPPDATA"\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Web Data" -File | Remove-Item -Confirm:$false
Write-Host "Chrome Cleaned" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Stopping IE Process" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
Get-Process -ProcessName MicrosoftEdge | Stop-Process -Force
Get-Process -ProcessName IExplore | Stop-Process -Force
Write-Host "Internet Explorer and Edge Processes Sucessfully Stopped" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Clearing IE Cache" -ForegroundColor Yellow
try{
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl, ClearMyTracksByProcess 8
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl, ClearMyTracksByProcess 2
Write-Host "IE and Edge Cleaned" -ForegroundColor Green
}catch{
echo $_
}
Write-Host "Cleanup Complete... Launching Teams" -ForegroundColor Green
Start-Process -FilePath $env:LOCALAPPDATA\Microsoft\Teams\current\Teams.exe
Stop-Process -Id $PID
}else{
Stop-Process -Id $PID
}