Guide · 6 min read
Keep your Teams status active without moving your mouse
Teams and Slack mark you "away" after a few minutes without keyboard or mouse input, even if you are still on a call, reading, or thinking. Here is what is actually happening and how to handle it responsibly.
Short answer
- Teams and Slack infer availability from local keyboard and mouse activity, not from whether you are actually present.
- A mouse jiggler keeps that activity signal alive by generating small cursor movements, which can prevent the automatic away status while you are legitimately at your desk.
- This is meant for people who are at their computer but not typing or clicking constantly — for example on a call, reading, or in a meeting — not for appearing present while absent.
- Always check your employer's monitoring and remote-work policies before relying on any keep-awake tool for presence status.
Why Teams and Slack mark you "away"
Both apps use an idle timer, usually a few minutes, based on local keyboard and mouse input. If neither moves during that window, your status flips to "away", regardless of what you are actually doing on screen.
That means listening to a call, reading a long document, or thinking through a problem can all trigger the same away status as being gone entirely.
What a mouse jiggler actually changes
Mouse Jiggler generates small, configurable cursor movements at intervals you control. The operating system registers that as input, which resets the idle timer Teams and Slack are watching.
- Runs locally on your computer
- Movement interval and style are configurable
- Works the same way for Teams, Slack, or any tool that reads local input
Where the line is
The legitimate use case is staying present: you are at your desk, on a call, or working through something that does not require constant clicking, and you do not want a status flip to interrupt that.
It is not intended to make you appear present while you are away, or to bypass monitoring your employer has put in place. Users are responsible for following their organization's policies.
Setting it up for meetings and calls
Start Mouse Jiggler when a call or focused reading session begins, and stop it when you step away. Treating it as session-based, rather than leaving it running all day, keeps the use aligned with the legitimate case above.
FAQ
Why does Teams show me as away when I am on a call?
Teams bases status on local keyboard and mouse activity, not on whether you are on a call. If you are not typing or clicking, the idle timer can still mark you away.
Is using a mouse jiggler against company policy?
It depends on your employer's policy. Check your organization's remote-work and monitoring guidelines before relying on it for presence status.
Does Mouse Jiggler work with Slack too?
Yes. Slack uses a similar local-activity idle timer, so the same cursor-movement approach applies.