Among the most popular services of Microsoft there is certainly the Outlook mail client, widely used especially in companies and offices.
In these places, it can therefore happen to take holidays or to be absent temporarily and for this reason, it could be an excellent idea to set up outlook auto reply to the receipt of some or all of the email messages. So let’s see how to do it from any compatible device.
How to Set Up Outlook Auto Reply
Set up automatic reply Outlook on the web
The Outlook website is undoubtedly the most convenient place to use the aforementioned platform. Among its advanced settings there will also be the possibility of activating an automatic reply upon receipt of messages.
- Log into the Outlook website by entering your credentials
- Click on the settings icon (gear) at the top right
- Choose the item “View all Outlook settings” at the bottom
- Click on the “Mail” tab in the left column and then on “Automatic replies” in the center
- Activate the “Activate automatic replies” toggle
- Choose whether to set a time period or automatically answer indefinitely
- Add your message in the text field that appears
- Choose whether to automatically reply to all or only to contacts saved in the address book
- Conclude with “Save” at the bottom right
Obviously, the procedure can also be completed from the mobile web interface of the same website. In particular, in this case, it will be sufficient to click on the icon with three horizontal lines at the top left and continue with the “Automatic replies” option.
Set up Outlook auto reply via app
Obviously, Outlook also has its own desktop application, perfectly compatible with both Windows and macOS. The steps to follow, however, will change according to the operating system used.
Windows
And let’s start with Windows, an operating system produced by Microsoft itself and capable of offering the app and Outlook support by default.
- Open the Outlook app on the Windows PC (log in with your data if necessary)
- Click on “File” at the top
- Choose the item “Automatic replies (Out of office)” in the new screen that appears
- Activate the “Activate automatic replies” toggle
- Choose whether to set a time period or automatically answer indefinitely
- Add your message in the text field that appears
- Choose whether to automatically reply to all or only to contacts saved in the address book
- Conclude with “OK” at the bottom to confirm
In addition, it will also be possible to activate the item “Internal to the organization” in case you want to create automatic messages to be sent to all employees with access to the same company email.
macOS
As already mentioned above, even on macOS you can set automatic responses, but with some small differences during the configuration.
- Open the Outlook app on the Mac (log in with your data if necessary)
- Click on “Tools” at the top
- Choose the item “Out of office”
- Activate the toggle “Send automatic replies for the account …”
- Choose whether to set a time period or automatically answer indefinitely
- Add your message in the text field that appears
- Choose whether to automatically reply to all or only to contacts saved in the address book
- Conclude with “OK” at the bottom to confirm
Set Outlook Auto Reply via “Rules”
All mail clients have “Rules”, which obviously can also be used to automatically reply to some messages. Once again the procedure will apply to both Windows and macOS.
Windows
Also to set the “Rules” you can use the Outlook application already installed on Windows PCs.
- Open the Outlook app on the Windows PC (log in with your data if necessary)
- Click on “New e-mail message” at the top left
- Write the message to be sent automatically (including the Subject)
- Click on “File” at the top left, then on “Save as” and select the “Outlook OTF Model” format
- Click again on “File”
- Choose the item “Rules and warnings”
- Select “New rule”
- Continue with “Apply rule to all received messages” and then with “Next” and again “Next”
- Confirm with “Yes”
- Click on “Reply using a specific template” and then select “Specific template” at the bottom
- Select the Outlook OTF model saved previously and click on “Open”
- Click on “Next”, then on “Next” again and conclude with “Finish”
macOS
As for macOS instead, the procedure will be much simpler and more intuitive.
- Open the Outlook app on the Mac (log in with your data if necessary)
- Click on “Organize” at the top and then on “Rules”
- Continue with “Edit rules”
- Continue with “IMAP” (or “POP”) and click on the “+” icon at the bottom
- Give the rule any name (for example “Auto Reply”)
- In the section “Perform the following action:”, click on “+”
- Click on “Move message” and select “Reply” from the drop-down menu
- Choose “Reply text” and write the text of the automatic message
- Confirm with “OK” and then again on “OK”