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Overview
In 2020, Microsoft released a preview version of a new Outlook client for Macs. This new version of Outlook includes both UI and feature improvements, and continues to be developed and updated on a monthly basis. However, it is still not considered a final product so you may encounter some issues if you switch.
Details
At this time, the Help Desk supports but does not recommend using the New Outlook client due to missing features and miscellaneous bugs and issues. As the product matures we will update our recommendation on this page.
To enable or disable the new Outlook on your Mac, launch Outlook and click the New Outlook toggle in the upper right hand corner. Either enabling or disabling New Outlook requires restarting Outlook. Switching between modes does not affect any data, including emails, contacts, or calendar appointments. However, when enabling New Outlook you may receive a warning if a certain feature is not supported. You can choose to either continue with the switch or cancel.
If you do not see an option to enable New Outlook, ensure your version of Outlook is at 16.42 or higher. You can check this by opening Outlook and choosing Outlook>About Outlook in the menu bar. If your Outlook client is at 16.41 or lower, choose Help>Check For Updates in the menu bar and follow directions to update Outlook on your Mac.
New Outlook introduces several new features and changes to the Outlook interface you are familiar with. Some of the highlights are listed below:
- Toolbar menu: A simplified toolbar replaces the traditional Office Ribbon. While fewer options are immediately available, you can customize the toolbar to add any commands that may be missing, or access additional options via the menu bar.
- Search: New Outlook does not use the built in Spotlight indexing feature for email searches and instead uses a proprietary database to index and search your emails. This is a welcome change due to frequent issues with Spotlight index corruption impacting email searches on previous versions of Outlook.
- My Day: A new sidebar view is enabled by default in New Outlook, called My Day. My Day shows a mini calendar, highlights upcoming appointments or meetings, and any pending tasks.
- Reduced Popups: When composing, replying, or forwarding an email, a new window is no longer automatically opened with each action. Instead, the action occurs in the Reading Pane. In addition, you can RSVP to meeting requests directly from the meeting invite.
New Outlook continues to receives monthly updates to add all currently missing features from the existing Outlook client. Some of the missing items and roadblocks you may encounter are listed below:
Known issues include:
- Ability to update Exchange account password. If you are using New Outlook and change your University network password, you will need to revert to the old client of Outlook in order to update your password. Once your password is updated and your email has started syncing again, you can switch back to New Outlook.
- Intermittent issues with accessing Shared Calendars and events created by delegates: If you access shared calendars, or have a co-worker who has delegate access to create meetings for you, these events may not sync up correctly in all instances.
- Unable to add Shared Mailboxes: If you need to add a new Shared Mailbox to Outlook, you will need to revert to Legacy Outlook temporarily in order to add the new account. If you attempt to add the account in New Outlook, you'll receive a "Account already exists" error message.
See Also
The new Outlook for Mac
New Outlook for Mac Features