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Microsoft Announces Outlook for Mac is Now Free to Use

Minxy said:
I haven't used an email program on my computer for years.
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I considered going cloud-only on my private gmail account a while ago, but then I accidentally locked myself out of my account with no way to recover. Since then I'm careful with having a local copy of important stuff. Not that everything in that account was important, but still reassuring that I can upload my old emails into a new account without losing years of information.

Tagbert said:
That unification is one of the best features. I frequently turn emails into calendar events and email from calendar events to all attendees.
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I agree that's great on the desktop and a functionality I use daily, but on my phone I really dislike how it's basically impossible to go back between an email and a calendar entry because it's the same app. I always thought some in-app split screen would be amazing.
 
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Oh that's fantastic! I'm gonna download it right away then. No more having to have a gmail tab open at all times now.
 
no such thing as "free" from microsoft
i'd assume this is just another way of collecting a lot of data about its users (windows 11 is basically spyware at this point)
 
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I've tried (and failed) to love MacOS Mail app, but it always seem to get 'stuck' with syncing somewhere along the way. I recently tried it again with Ventura and it seems to work fine for a bit, and then when I tried to move messages from one folder to another, something like 50 messages got 'stuck' moving and wouldn't move!

This always seems to happen.

Outlook has been a workhorse for me. It generally works really well. although I dislike how it doesn't keep a local copy of the mail any more and has to load messages when you scroll down too far.

I use an Outlook.com personal email address, a legacy Gmail account and several MS Exchange accounts for work. I don't use iCloud, so YMMV.
 
andrewxgx said:
no such thing as "free" from microsoft
i'd assume this is just another way of collecting a lot of data about its users (windows 11 is basically spyware at this point)
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Microsoft Teams is free

Microsoft Solitaire Collection on iOS is free

Microsoft Visual Studio is free

Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio is free

Microsoft Windows upgrades are free

Minecraft updates are free

Microsoft OneNote is free

I can keep going if you want
 
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CalMin said:
I've tried (and failed) to love MacOS Mail app, but it always seem to get 'stuck' with syncing somewhere along the way. I recently tried it again with Ventura and it seems to work fine for a bit, and then when I tried to move messages from one folder to another, something like 50 messages got 'stuck' moving and wouldn't move!

This always seems to happen.

Outlook has been a workhorse for me. It generally works really well. although I dislike how it doesn't keep a local copy of the mail any more and has to load messages when you scroll down too far.

I use an Outlook.com personal email address, a legacy Gmail account and several MS Exchange accounts for work. I don't use iCloud, so YMMV.
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Aside from Gmail, Outlook has been the only email client that has worked well for me. It's kept everything so organized for me at work, and now I can have it at home for free, WITH widget support. Pretty pog if you ask me.
 
I use it for work; honestly one of the smoothest e-mail applications I've ever had the pleasure of using. And the Apple appearance is nice and streamlined for what I need.

Would never use it for my own persona e-mails, however.
 
I used to be a pretty loyal Apple fan. I tried to force my way through college using pages/numbers, but looking back that was foolish. I have spent many many hours in mail, making it work the way I like, but I never really liked it (same with numbers/pages). Several years ago I started using windows 10 & Microsoft office, honestly everything is so much better. Like so much better, and without the compatibility headaches too! I finally have a computer that is capable of functioning in the real world and it feels great. I am still using a Mac because thats what I owned at the time of transition, but I almost never boot Mac OS up now. When I do boot Mac OS it is never a "great" experience.

Frankly when time comes to buy a new computer. Buying/building a plain old PC just might be a real possibility, we will see when that time comes.

Long story short. Face it. Microsoft office is much much better software than anything Apple has to offer.
 
makzr said:
Outlook for macOS (like the iOS version) stores your account credentials and mails on Microsoft servers (also the credentials an mails from non-MS accounts). It‘s a privacy nightmare. If you care for privacy I highly recommend you: don‘t use it!!!
I‘m a little disappointed that macrumors doesn’t mention it in the article.
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Only if you are using Outlook.com email. Ofcourse its like saying Gmail stores your google mail on google servers...

NO it does NOT store your other emails on MS servers. Where do you come up with this BS?
 
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andrewxgx said:
no such thing as "free" from microsoft
i'd assume this is just another way of collecting a lot of data about its users (windows 11 is basically spyware at this point)
Click to expand...
Same as macOS! Apple is spying on you so much. But no one is talking about it.
 
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applefan69 said:
I used to be a pretty loyal Apple fan. I tried to force my way through college using pages/numbers, but looking back that was foolish. I have spent many many hours in mail, making it work the way I like, but I never really liked it (same with numbers/pages). Several years ago I started using windows 10 & Microsoft office, honestly everything is so much better. Like so much better, and without the compatibility headaches too! I finally have a computer that is capable of functioning in the real world and it feels great. I am still using a Mac because thats what I owned at the time of transition, but I almost never boot Mac OS up now. When I do boot Mac OS it is never a "great" experience.

Frankly when time comes to buy a new computer. Buying/building a plain old PC just might be a real possibility, we will see when that time comes.

Long story short. Face it. Microsoft office is much much better software than anything Apple has to offer.
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Were you around during the 2013? Do you remember how pissed off people were when Apple dumbed down the iWork?

They were like that for a reason. Even then the loyal defenders said "oh shut up, it's not a big deal/it will get better". Well, it was a big deal. And it never got better.

For like a decade now, the Apple's answer to power users and pros was "it is what it is, if it's not enough, go get 3rd party options. We simply do not care".
 
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I use it for my corporate account. I don’t think this will grow their audience. More of a convenience for their existing customers.
 
xraydoc said:
I'm forced to use Outlook for work email, but keep personal stuff on Apple's Mail app on both macOS and iOS.
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Same. I have outlook on my work windows computer and outlook, for work email, on iPhone. Personal mail in the mail app, and never the two shall meet.
 
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MacRumors said:


Microsoft today announced that its Outlook app for Mac is now free to use, with a Microsoft 365 subscription or license no longer necessary.

Outlook-Mac.jpeg

Outlook supports multiple email providers, including Outlook.com, Gmail, iCloud, Yahoo Mail, and others, with a unified inbox and universal search functionality available. As noted by The Verge, the app has been optimized for Macs with Apple silicon chips.

Microsoft redesigned Outlook on macOS in 2020, and the app supports Notification Center widgets, Handoff between macOS and iOS, and more.

Outlook for Mac is available for free on the Mac App Store.

Article Link: Microsoft Announces Outlook for Mac is Now Free to Use
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Good. I used to use this app but these days I cut Thunderbird and Outlook and only use Mail. However I regularly have to troubleshoot outlook via screen share since my mom uses it.
 
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bsbeamer said:
Apple has a chance to fix Apple Mail and the constant "this message has no content" blank emails. If not, there will be more people who give this a shot.
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I use Thunderbird on my Mac. Apple Mail? Nah. Outlook? Never in a gazillion years even if MS paid me $100,000.
If I want to move my email to Windows (shudder) or Linux then I can just by copying the files. I got suckered by Lookout for years at work back in the day when you would get .pst corruptions. That's why I moved to Thunderbird almost 20 years ago. It does everything I need from an email client. Your use case may well be different.
As I don't do email on my iPhone there is no need to look elsewhere.
 
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Practically speaking? It used to be, there were quite a few people hosting Exchange mail servers out there. A long time ago, there was even a Linux based product that pretended to be an Exchange server, so Outlook could connect to it and share calendar/schedule info and the whole bit.

These days, almost everyone interested will just buy the Office 365 subscription because it includes a free Exchange mailbox/login with it. That winds up cheaper than paying for access to some third party email hosting service.

That's probably why MS decided to give Outlook for Mac away free? The people who'd use it free and not pay for O365 are the ones who only want to use it to link to POP3 mail or IMAP mail to something like Gmail -- and aren't making full use of Outlook's features.
 
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