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A beginner's guide to using Outlook for business email — reading, sending, replying, organizing, and using the calendar.

Outlook is Microsoft's email and calendar app. It comes with the Microsoft 365 business subscriptions that include email — Business Basic, Business Standard and Business Premium — and is one of the most widely used business email tools around. This guide covers the essentials so you can get up and running quickly.

Quick summary

You can use Outlook in your browser at outlook.office.com, or as a desktop app installed on your computer. Your inbox, calendar, and contacts all live in one place. This guide covers the web version, which looks the same on any computer.

Windows has two Outlooks

Microsoft ships two desktop versions for Windows — new Outlook and classic Outlook — and their menus differ. Microsoft's own help articles are split by version. If a step below doesn't match what you see, you are probably on the other one.

Accessing Outlook

Go to outlook.office.com and sign in with your work email and password. This is the easiest way to access email from any computer — no installation needed. Microsoft's own sign-in article points people at microsoft365.com or outlook.office365.com; all three get you to the same place.

Reading email

When you open Outlook, you will see your Inbox in the left panel. Click any email to read it in the main panel.

At the top of each email you will see the sender's name, the subject line, and the time it arrived. Below that is the email body.

Key actions on an email:

Reply — respond to the sender only
Reply all — respond to everyone in the To and CC fields
Forward — send the email to someone new
Delete — move it to the Deleted Items folder
Flag — mark it for follow-up

Sending a new email

Select New, then Mail. (In classic Outlook for Windows the button is New Email. In both Windows versions Ctrl+N does the same thing; in the browser the equivalent shortcut is N.)

Type the recipient's email address in the To field. As you type, Outlook will suggest contacts. Press Enter or click a suggestion to add them.

Add a Cc or Bcc if needed. Cc copies someone in visibly. Bcc copies them invisibly. If you don't see the Bcc button, select Bcc to the right of the To button.

Write a clear subject line. This helps the recipient know what the email is about before they open it.

Write your message in the body area below the subject line.

Click Send.

The calendar

Click Calendar in the left-hand navigation (usually a calendar icon). Here you can:

See all your scheduled events and meetings
Create new events by clicking a time slot
Accept or decline meeting invitations (they appear in your inbox as invitations, and accepted ones show up automatically on your calendar)

Basic organization

You can keep your inbox tidy with a few simple tools:

Folders — move emails into folders to keep them organized. Right-click Folders at the top of the left panel (or an existing folder) and choose Create new folder.
Rules — automatically sort incoming email into folders. See Organizing Outlook with rules & folders for a full guide.
Archive — moves an email into your Archive folder without deleting it. You get to it from Archive in the folder list, and you can send a message back to another folder with Move to.
Sweep — deletes unwanted email in bulk. It can delete all incoming email from a particular sender, keep only the latest email from them, or delete their email older than 10 days. Sweep rules run once a day.
Move to — moves messages to a folder you choose, including all email from one sender.

Deleted items aren't gone immediately

When you delete an email, it goes to the Deleted Items folder. By default Microsoft 365 puts no time limit on how long it sits there, so it stays until you or your admin clears it out. Once it leaves Deleted Items, it's recoverable for a further 14 days by default — your admin can raise that to a maximum of 30 days. If you delete something by mistake, check the Deleted Items folder first.

Setting up your email signature

Every email you send should have your name, title, and contact details at the bottom. See Setting up your Outlook signature for step-by-step instructions.

Searching for emails

The search bar at the top of Outlook searches your email, contacts, and calendar. Type a name, subject, or keyword. Outlook will show matching results. You can filter results by date, sender, or folder.

Common questions

How do I mark an email as unread?

Select the email, then use the Read / Unread command in the Tags section of the ribbon. Right-clicking the message usually offers the same thing. This puts the bold formatting back so you remember to go back to it.

What is the Focused Inbox?

Focused Inbox separates your inbox into two tabs — Focused and Other — so lower-priority mail stays out of your way. To turn it on or off in new Outlook, go to View → View Settings, then under Mail → Layout pick the account and choose either Sort messages into Focused and Other or Don't sort my messages. In Outlook on the web the same two options live under Settings → Mail → Layout.

How do I add someone to my contacts?

Open the email in the reading pane and select the sender's (or a recipient's) name. Their profile card opens. On the card, select More options → Add to contacts, fill in any details you want, and select Save. To add someone from scratch, select People in the navigation pane, then New contact on the Home tab, enter a name and any other details, and select Save.

Can I access Outlook when I'm offline?

In the desktop app, yes. Offline access is on by default in new Outlook for Windows: it saves a copy of your mail, calendar and people to your device so you can work without a connection, and syncs when you reconnect. Classic Outlook has a Send / Receive → Work Offline switch. In the browser, assume you need an internet connection — offline support there depends on which version of Outlook on the web your organization is using.

Need a hand?

If you're stuck, email support@chykalophia.com and we'll help. Include your website address and a screenshot if you can.

Outlook basics for business