Work offline in Outlook

Offline access in the new Outlook for Windows

You can use the new Outlook for Windows even when you're not connected to the internet by enabling offline access. When turned on, the new Outlook for Windows saves a copy of your emails, calendar events, and people (previously contacts) to your device, providing access to these items when you're offline and improved performance when you're online.

Your offline settings determine which items are saved to your device and for how long. To set these, see the section below Update offline settings. When you're back online, new Outlook for Windows automatically updates the items that were saved to your device.

What can I do when I'm offline in new Outlook?

Most actions you perform online are also available when you're offline. These include, but aren't limited to:

If you try to do something that's not available offline, you'll get an error message, or the changes you made will revert back to what was previously saved.

Update offline settings in new Outlook

Update these settings to choose which folders to save and how many days of items to save. If you have more than one account, select the account you want the settings to apply to:

Select which folders to save locally:

1. Select Settings > General > Offline > Folders to save.

2. From the dropdown, select Default (Inbox, sent, drafts, archive, deleted and snoozed), Default and favorites (this is set by default), or Default, favorites, and recently used.

Select the number of days to save emails locally:

1. Select Settings > General > Offline > Days of email to save.

2. From the dropdown, select 7 (this is the default value), 30, 90, or 180 days of email to save.

Turn offline access on or off in new Outlook

Offline is turned on by default in new Outlook for Windows. To turn it off or on, do the following:

1. Select Settings > General > Offline.

2. Select the toggle Enable offline email, calendar, and people to turn offline access on or off.

3. Select Save.

What else do I need to know about working offline in new Outlook?

The following aren't currently available offline, but we plan to include in future updates:

• Create, delete, and move folders (rolling out)

• RSVP to meeting invitations (rolling out)

• Search for emails (in development)

• View and add attachments and images (in development)

• View shared and delegated mailboxes (in development)

• Create, update, and delete calendar events (in development) 

• Change sort for emails 

• View and update settings for notifications, signatures, and calendars

Other capabilities that aren't available when offline:

• View email and calendar groups

• View favorited people, categories, and search folders

• Create, update, and delete calendar people (previously contacts)

• View entire global address list

Switch between working offline and working online in classic Outlook

• Click Send / Receive > Work Offline.

  

When Outlook switches between working online and offline in classic Outlook, all email accounts are changed.

You know you're working offline when Work Offline is highlighted on the ribbon or Working Offline appears on the status bar at the bottom of the classic Outlook window.

When you're ready to work online again, click Send / Receive > Work Offline. The button text doesn't change, but it's only highlighted when you're working offline. Working Offline on the status bar also goes away when you're working online.

Change how much mail to keep offline in classic Outlook

1. Click File > Account Settings > Account Settings.

   

2. Select an Exchange or Microsoft 365 account, and then click Change.

   

3. Under Offline Settings, move the slider to the desired amount of time, such as All, 12 months, 6 months, 3 months, or 1 month. Note: If you're using Outlook 2016, you can also select an amount of time as short as 3 days.

   

   For example, if you move the slider to 3 months, only mail from the past three months will be synchronized to your Offline Outlook Data (.ost) file from the Exchange server. Items older than 3 months reside only in your mailbox on the server. You can change this setting at any time.

   Cached Exchange Mode, which downloads a copy of your messages, must be turned on.
   
   If you're using Outlook with an Microsoft 365 account, we recommend you use Cached Exchange Mode.

By default, Outlook configures Exchange and Microsoft 365 accounts to only synchronize 12 months of your email.

Changing the amount of data to synchronize can affect the time it takes Outlook to open as well as the amount of storage space Outlook uses on your computer. If you're running in a virtual desktop environment, we recommend you only synchronize one month of data.

Status messages in classic Outlook

How do you know when you're working offline or online in Outlook? There are visual cues, starting with the status bar at the bottom of your Outlook window. If either of the following status indicators are shown, it means Outlook isn't connected to your mail server.

or

You can't send or receive email until you reconnect.

Tips for reconnecting to classic Outlook

Here are some suggested ways to reconnect to classic Outlook.

Reset the Work Offline status

• On the Send/Receive tab, choose Work Offline, and check your status bar. If the status shows Working Offline, repeat the action until the status changes to connected.

Check for updates

• Read the check for updates topic and install any required updates.

Create a new profile

To eliminate the possibility that there's a fault in your current Outlook profile, create a new profile. If you open classic Outlook using the new profile and it's still disconnected, try removing your account and then adding it back again.

1. To remove an email account, follow remove or delete an email account from classic Outlook for Windows

2. Follow the steps in adding the account again to proceed.

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Change send and receive settings when working offline in classic Outlook