Sharing .idea folder with team, what might happen during an IntelliJ upgrade?

We are considering adding certain .idea files to our vcs in order to share them across the team (such as code style). I am wondering what might happen during an IntelliJ upgrade where the format or location of those files change. If we checkin the update, then team members still on the older version would likely have issues reading the new file formats, correct? What workflow does JetBrains suggest in a situation like that?