Outlook for Windows
Outlook for Windows (also referred to as New Outlook) is an email client developed by Microsoft. It is a replacement of the preloaded Windows Mail, Calendar apps and the contact management People app on Windows 10 and 11, and is shipping as default with all versions of Windows 11 since 2024, beginning with version 24H2.
History
The new Outlook was outlined under Microsoft's 'One Outlook' plan, with testing starting in 2022. In September 2023, Microsoft started transitioning users of the previous apps to the new Outlook. It was released on the Microsoft Store that month, although it remained in preview status for enterprise and education users.
Features
Outlook for Windows is a web app based on the WebView2 runtime, and builds on features found in Outlook on the web. It still has some features from Microsoft Outlook (which Microsoft refers to as Classic Outlook in this context) missing, such as support for .pst files, which is due to be added at a future date.
The free version includes advertising, and allows IMAP accounts to be set up. It does not support iCloud aliases, but it is able to work offline.
Controversy
New Outlook has attracted controversy surrounding the decision to synchronize emails from Non-Microsoft accounts with the Microsoft cloud, rather than downloading the email to local devices as previous Outlook clients have done. Concerns have been raised around the privacy implications of such a system.