Basic tasks using screen reader with email in Outlook for Mac

This article is for people who use a screen reader program such as Windows Narrator, JAWS, or NVDA with Windows tools or features and  Microsoft 365 products. This article is part of the Accessibility help & learning content set where you can find more accessibility information on our apps. For general help, visit Microsoft Support.

Use the email in Outlook for Mac with VoiceOver, the built-in macOS screen reader, to do the essential basic tasks. You can create and send new emails, read and reply to received emails, search, filter, and print emails, work with attachments, and more.

Notes:

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This topic assumes that you are using the built-in macOS screen reader, VoiceOver. To learn more about using VoiceOver, go to VoiceOver Getting Started Guide.

In this topic

Read and reply to or forward an email

Read an email

By default, the Outlook app lists emails with the newest first.

In Outlook, press Command+1 to open the Mail main view. In the Mail view, to move the focus to the message list, press the Tab key until you hear the sender and subject of the first message in the message list.
To browse the message list, press the Down arrow key to go to the next message, or the Up arrow key to go to the previous message.
VoiceOver reads info about the emails in your Inbox as you move. You hear, for example, the following:
- The name of the sender
- The subject of the email
- The sending date
- If there are attachments
To open a single email or an email conversation with several messages, press Command+O. The message window opens, and you hear: "Now in <message subject>."
To read an email or messages in a conversation, press the Right or Left arrow keys. VoiceOver reads the message fields as you move.
When you are finished, to close the message window, press Command+W. The message windows closes and the focus moves to the Inbox message list.

Read an email from the Notification Center

Go to the Notification Center on your Mac to read the most recent emails from Outlook.

To go to the menu extras in the menu bar, press Control+Option+M, M. You hear: "Menu Extras."
To go to the Notification Center, press the Right arrow key until you hear "Notification center, menu extra," and then press Control+Option+Spacebar.
To go to Notifications in the Notification Center, press Control+Option+Right or Left arrow key until you hear "Notifications, radio button," and then press Control+Option+Shift+Down arrow key.
To browse the notifications list, press the Right or Left arrow key. As you land in an Outlook notification, VoiceOver reads the notification as "Microsoft Outlook," followed by the message time, subject, sender, and the message body. To open the email, press Return.

Reply to an email

In an email message, do one of the following:
- To reply to the sender of the message, press Command+R.
- To reply to all, press Shift+Command+R.
A new email opens with the same subject and set to reply to either just the sender or everyone included in the original email. The focus is on the body of the message. Type your message.
When you are finished composing the message, to send the email, press Command+Return.

Forward an email

In an email message, press Command+J.
The focus is on the To field. You hear: "To recipients." Type the name of each recipient.
If you want to include a message, press the Tab key until you hear "Edit text," and then type your message.
When you are finished composing the message, press Command+Return to send the email.

Create and send email

In Outlook, press Command+1 to open the Mail main view.
To create a new email, press Command+N. A new message opens on the sidebar.
Press the Tab key until you hear: "To recipients." Type the name of each recipient.
To send a copy, press the Tab key until you hear "Show CC, button," and press Return. The focus moves to the Cc field. Type the names of contacts who you want to receive a copy.

To send a hidden copy, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear "Show Bcc, button," and press Return. The focus moves to the Bcc field. Type the names of contacts who you want to receive a hidden copy.
To type a subject for the email, press the Tab key until you hear "Subject, edit text," and then type the subject you want.
To type your message, press the Tab key until you hear "Edit text," and then type the message you want.
When you are finished composing the message, press Command+Return to send the email.

Work with Focused inbox

Focus on the emails that matter the most to you. By default, Outlook creates a Focused inbox and an Other inbox. Your most important emails are sorted into the Focused inbox while the rest remain easily accessible, but out of the way, in the Other inbox.

Switch between the Focused and Other inboxes

By default, Outlook opens the Focused inbox.

In Inbox, press the Tab key once until you hear "Focused inbox selected," and then press Return to open the Other inbox.
To move back to the Focused inbox, press the Tab key until you hear "Other inbox selected," and press Return.

Move an email from the Other inbox to the Focused inbox

In your Other inbox, navigate to the email you want to move to the Focused inbox.
To move the email, press Option+O. You hear: "Move to Other."

Hide the Focused inbox

You can hide the Focused inbox and work with a single list of messages.

To check if the Focused inbox is shown or already hidden, press the Tab key once when in Inbox. If the Focused inbox is shown, you hear either "Focused inbox selected," or "Focused inbox unselected."
Press the Tab key until you hear "Filter and sort," then press Control+Option+Spacebar to open the drop-down menu.
Press the Down arrow key until you hear "Settings," and press Return. The Settings window opens.
Press the Tab key until you hear "Sort messages into Focused and Other," then press Return to toggle the option off.
To close the Settings window, press Command+W.

Use search and filter to find an email

Waste no time excavating through lists or archives for that important email. Use the search and filter options to quickly find what you're looking for.

Search for an email

In the Mail view, press Option+Command+F to open the Search tab. You hear "Expanded search," and the focus moves to the Search in drop-down menu.
You can search in the current folder, subfolders, or the current mailbox. To choose between the available options, press the Up or Down arrow key until you hear the one you want and press Return to select it.
You can search for your term in the From, To, Subject, or Keywords field. To select a field, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear the one you want and type your search term.
To search for your term in the selected field, press the Tab key until you hear "Search, button," and press Return. The search results are displayed in the message list, and the focus moves to the first item on the list.
To browse through the search results, press the Up or Down arrow keys. As you move, VoiceOver announces the messages by the message subject, sender, and date.
To open an email, press Command+O. To close the email window and return to Mail view, press Command+W.
When done, in the Mail view, to exit the Search, press Shift+Tab until you hear "Cancel search, button," and then press Return.

Use a filter to find an email

In the Mail view, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear: "Filter and sort, popup button."
To open the filtering list of options, press Control+Option+Spacebar. Press the Down arrow key until you hear the filtering option you want, and then press Return. The focus moves to the message list containing emails matching the filter.
To browse through the emails matching the filter, press the Down arrow key to go to the next message, or the Up arrow key to go to the previous message. VoiceOver reads the message details as you move through the list.
To open an email, press Command+O.
To remove the filtering option, in the Mail view, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab, until you hear "Filter and sort, popup button," and then press Control+Option+Spacebar. Press the Down arrow key until you hear "Tick," followed by the name of the filtering option you selected and then press Spacebar to remove it.

Open or add attachments

You can open and add attachments in your emails in Outlook for Mac.

Open an attachment

VoiceOver announces if a received email has attachments.

Open the email with one or more attachments.
Press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear "Attachment," followed by the file name and size, and press Spacebar. The attachment opens in the supported app.

Add an attachment

You can send files like resumes, photos, or meeting invitations as attachments.

Attach a file

When you're composing a message, in the new email window, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear "Attach, button," and then press Control+Option+Spacebar. A dialog box opens and you can browse for the file you want to attach, for example, from your Documents or iCloud.
Browse to the file you want, and then press Control+Option+Spacebar to select it.
The file is attached to your email and focus moves back to the new email window.

Insert an image or picture

When you're composing a message, in the new email window, press the Tab key or Shift+Tab until you hear "Entering Formatting Bar group," and then press the Right arrow key until you hear: "Pictures." Press Control+Option+Spacebar to open the Pictures dropdown menu.
Press the Down arrow key until you hear "Picture from File," and then press Spacebar. A dialog box opens and you can browse for the image file you want to attach.
Browse to the image you want, and then press Control+Option+Spacebar to select it.
The image or picture is inserted in the message body.

Print an email

You can print your email on paper or to a file.

In Outlook, select the email you want to print.
Press Command+P to open the Print dialog box. To print the email, press the Tab key until you hear "Print, default button," and then press Return to send the document to your default printer.

Turn visual or audio notifications on or off

You can quickly turn notifications on or off.

In Outlook, press Command+Comma (,) to open Outlook Preferences. You hear: "Preferences, show all button."
Press the Tab key until you hear "Notifications and sounds button," and then press Spacebar. The Notifications and Sounds window opens.
To turn all notifications on or off, press the Tab key until you hear "Display an alert on my desktop," and then press Spacebar to turn the setting on ("ticked") or off ("unticked").
To turn audio notifications on or off, press the Tab key until you hear "New message" or "Reminder," and then press Spacebar to turn the audio notifications for new messages or reminders, on ("ticked") or off ("unticked").

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