[Windows] v15.41.7

New features

• Switch with ease between the new and current interface.

How to switch? Where is the switch? Tragedy.

There's a few uses cases where that simply doesn't work:

• Connecting to a PC with a fixed TeamViewer ID and password (not necessarily managed by the company that connects into it)
• Session management (on the side of the person taking control of remote PC) doesn't seem to indicate anything about which remote PC it's related to, or which direction the connection is used (to/from which PCs)
• The user in front of the PC that needs to be shared may not be able to access an e-mail or a download link. (Various reasons: in some corporate environments, some download links may not be allowed, some users may not even have an e-mail address at all, or at least not accessible from that PC)
• The obvious classic case to connect to someone's PC: "can you help me, I can't access my e-mail?"

The new UI is objectively more complicated (at the very least because we now have to deal with the concept of "sessions" too).

There's a number of cases where the new system doesn't make much of a difference indeed, but there's also a number of existing use cases that have now become more complex.

It's not just a matter time to accept the change, unfortunately.

You know what the great thing is about having multiple machines to test with? Figuring things out myself.

HKCU\SOFTWARE\TeamViewer

Change DWORD value 'UIVersion' from 4 to 1.

Hope this helps others in a similar situation to ours.

This change is unbelievable to me. Its already causing me to lose time supporting this application rather than what I'm paid to support. I'm surprised there aren't more complaints in this thread.

I have been with Teamviewer for over 10 years now. I've loved it until now. I will wait until the end of my contract in the hopes that enough of their clients will revolt and convince them to put the ID info on the main screen. Otherwise I'll be switching to a competitor, and probably saving money to boot!

What a **bleep** shame, Teamviewer. 👎️

@JeanK This is infuriating, as far as I can tell there is no settings cog/wheel/gear on the splash screen in the new UI to get to the settings menu. Likewise there is not one in your screenshot, and not on the handful of clients I have had to deal with in the last couple of days. Only option seems to be the registry setting that some commentors have very helpfully posted.

Another really annoying thing with the new UI is that if you open it by double-clicking on the desktop icon, then realize you don't want it & go to close it, it immediately goes to the "close all connections" dialog rather than just minimizing itself and notifying the user that it is still running in the background. That is an unwelcome change that is sure to catch a lot of people off-guard and end up closing some connections that will be hard to get back. Also confusing is that it now does not show up in the system tray area, so that is another place that we are used to directing people to find out if it is running, get their client ID etc. that is no longer available.

Rollout fail, sorry

Hi @JeanK,

Thank you for your answer. Here is a reply, point by point, based on actual use cases.

Connecting to a PC with a fixed TeamViewer ID and password

Connecting to a TeamViewer ID is the primary use-case and should really stay as the first thing the user sees. This is not just about fixed passwords and unattended access.

If you want to split TeamViewer into a Host and a Viewer, that's fine, but keep the TeamViewer ID of the host and the ephemeral password visible as the first thing that shows up.

• Often, users can be handling multiple PCs. The fact they give me their TeamViewer ID at least tells me which one they're talking about (cases of using the wrong PC actually happen).
• I do pay for a TeamViewer licence, but I can't necessarily use "Manage this device" into my account, because the host device isn't mine. I'm given permission to connect by the PC owner (either via ephemeral or fixed password), but not to take possession of it as one of my managed devices. (Maybe they also want to let other users connect to it too.)
• There are many cases where users will just give you their ID/password and leave the room (lunch/going home/...). They'll give you permission to install/fix whatever they need, but that doesn't necessarily mean they'll allow you to set up a "fixed password". This is actually quite frequent. I can't necessarily require or wait for them to type the session ID using the new recommended way.

In real use cases, the process of people exchanging TeamViewer ID and password, and the connection itself can be quite asynchronous (the person in front of the PC might not be able to type anything straight away, if at all).

Call this "semi-attended" access if you wish, but that's a frequent case many of us have to deal with (I've seen similar use cases in other comments).

Session Management

What you refer to is not what I meant. See screenshot in this post: https://community.teamviewer.com/English/discussion/129541/new-ui-is-too-complex

I had created 3 sessions, 1 cancelled after closing the "Connect with ID" dialog without entering anything, the others with different TeamViewer IDs, but I can then see 3 sessions without having any idea which remote TeamViewer IDs they were for.

This is particularly a problem when I need to have multiple sessions, with completely different users, opened at the same time. Sure, you can edit the session name, but it's often too late. (Again, they may not enter the session ID immediately: the new model forces more synchronisation between participants.)

The old way (using the remote PC TeamViewer ID) is much simpler and effective.

The participant has no access to an e-mail or a download link / The obvious classic case to connect to someone's PC

See previous comments. They'll often just not wait around to type the new session ID, or won't be able to (and hopefully won't enter it into the wrong PC).

You seem to think it's just a matter of explaining the new way, but that's not the case.

The fundamental problem with this new version is that you've completely changed the workflow between participants. This requires more round trips, more synchronisation between participants and more steps in general. It's objectively more complex. Requiring more effort from the person in front of the controlled PC (even if you think it's not much) is generally a problem too.

Please make sure future updates keep the TeamViewer ID and password as the main information displayed at first on the host. Simplicity was the whole point of using TeamViewer.

@JeanK So let me get this straight, to have access to the program's settings, including reverting to the classic interface, you have to have (or create) and account & log in to it? So every PC that we set this up on, we will have to go through logging in to our account - which of course means adding it to our trusted devices with all the back & forth emails, MFA etc - even if that person will never need access/maybe shouldn't have access to that account, or if we aren't being asked to add it to our account, or if it is a one-time assist. Or what if we have several hundred of them to roll out. . . Even for a free home user, just to change their settings - say to use the classic interface, or set a permanent password so their more tech-savvy teenager can help them out - they will have to create an account?? Or the support professional, without yet being able to get access to their PC, will need to get it logged in to their account so they can get the Client ID from the user?

Thanks goodness we have quickly found the registry setting for the UI, I will be implementing that via Group Policy at my support client locations.

And why hide the self-minimizing option many levels down in the advanced settings (which, remember, we can't get to without creating & signing in to an account. . ) Why change its default behavior at all? Great, make this a new option for those who want it - but why make it the new default, with the added pitfall of throwing up a choice with a 50/50 chance of closing the connection when the user does the obvious and closes that window, expecting from previous behavior that it will stay running in the system tray?

That is all so incredibly much less convenient than it has ever been before.

Also, why would you put what is essentially an ad for the product we already own and are currently using on the splash screen? That is going to age about as well as Clippy the MS Office Assistant. . .

Yeah, fine if you only do "quick support" but I need to set up permanent passwords and access PCs at random without interacting with the user every frigging time. That gets old very fast. I have sometihng over 400 remote users and getting a new password from them every time is a HUGE waste of time.

So to set a permanent password REQUIRES LOGGING IN TO A TEAMVIEWER ACCOUNT. And since you obviously can't log all your users in on your account, you then have to create a unique account for each user. Which is tedious at best.