Microsoft Office Outlook cheat sheet

Microsoft Office Outlook serves as a comprehensive application for organizing personal information and schedules. While its primary function revolves around email management, it boasts additional features, including a calendar, journal, notes, contact management, task management, and web browsing capabilities. Although part of the broader Microsoft Office Outlook, can also be purchased as a standalone program. Moreover, it seamlessly integrates with Microsoft Exchange Server and Microsoft SharePoint Server, catering to organizations requiring shared inboxes, calendars, or other data. With a user base exceeding a million, Outlook stands as a leading email client and personal management application worldwide. This is why it’s important to know all the tricks and features when working with it. Our cheat sheet aims to give you instructions on how to get up and running with Outlook and share some useful tips you can utilize in the future.

• Tip: Do you know anyone who’s just starting out with Outlook? Share the Outlook cheat sheet articles with friends, classmates, colleagues or your employees to ensure they can learn faster. Knowledge is power, and you have the ability to help others by sending them this cheat sheet.

Perpetual vs. Subscription License? Which one should you choose?

Outlook is part of the Microsoft Office suite, which makes it available in two different versions. Both versions offer distinct advantages and disadvantages tailored to different audiences, necessitating a thorough review of your options before making a purchase decision.

The “perpetual” license presents a cost-effective solution, requiring only a single payment for lifelong ownership of Outlook. However, Microsoft Office Outlook does not provide future updates with this option; once purchased, you’ll retain the version available at the time and may need to acquire subsequent versions separately.

Conversely, opting for an Office 365 subscription offers its own set of benefits despite not providing perpetual ownership. While it may entail a higher cost, subscribers gain immediate access to multiple Office applications along with ongoing updates and exclusive features. If features like cloud sharing and collaborative teamwork are essential, a subscription is undoubtedly the preferable choice.

Get to know the Ribbon interface.

You should know that the Ribbon has been a major part of Office applications for several years now. It was introduced all the way back in Office 2007 with the intention of making navigation easier. Old-fashioned menus and multiple tiers of sub-menus can get confusing and tiring quickly. With the Ribbon, you can use a 

A graphical interface that assists you in finding the familiar tools you appreciate is much better.

The Ribbon is your way of navigating in Outlook, opening up the opportunities to format text, insert elements, tweak your emails and access other features. This means that first and foremost, we need to learn everything there is about the Ribbon.

In contrast to previous iterations of Outlook, newer releases feature a Ribbon with a sleeker design, aiming to reduce on-screen clutter and distractions. This minimalist approach provides the software with a contemporary and elegant appearance, distinguishing it from its competitors. If you’re looking to keep up with the times, we definitely recommend using either Microsoft Office Outlook 2016 or Microsoft Office Outlook 2019.

Toggle the Ribbon in Microsoft Office Outlook

There are various settings available to customize the appearance of the Ribbon in Outlook. Located at the top right corner of the screen, you’ll find an icon labelled “Ribbon Display Options,” which opens a dropdown menu offering three different choices:

• 1. Auto-hide Ribbon: Selecting this option hides the Ribbon along with its tabs and commands by default. To reveal the Ribbon and its contents, you need to click on the top section of the Outlook screen.
• 2. Show Tabs: This setting displays the ribbon tabs while hiding all commands underneath. You can reveal the commands by clicking on any of the tabs, pressing Ctrl + F1 on your keyboard, or choosing the “Show Tabs and Commands” option.
• 3. Show Tabs and Commands: With this option enabled, you can view the complete Ribbon, including both tabs and commands, which remain visible at all times.

Be efficient with the Tell Me bar.

While Outlook is a relatively beginner-friendly application, it’s easy to get lost in it especially for new users. Microsoft Office Outlook has made a change that helps everyone locate tools in the application with ease. Because of the huge amount of features and capabilities of Outlook, it can become tough to keep track of wherever every feature lives in the Ribbon. Spending a lot of time learning and memorizing tools isn’t an option for everyone, so we’d like to introduce you to this new feature.

The new “Tell me what you want to do” or simply “Tell Me” aims to eliminate this issue. You can use it by clicking on it right next to the last. 

You can utilize this functionality by selecting the designated option on the Ribbon or by pressing the Alt + Q keys on your keyboard. Once activated, you’ll observe that it enables you to input text directly, providing you with the opportunity to interact. Outlook what you want to do.

For example, let’s say that you want to insert a digital signature at the end of your email. In this case, you should open Tell Me and type in “digital signature.” Then, Outlook will return every tool related to signatures and let you use tools without ever knowing where they are in the Ribbon itself.

Other search results might provide useful insights and offer potential remedies to address your issue. For every task you input, there’s always an option to access assistance on the subject or utilize the Smart Lookup feature to search the internet.

In summary, the Tell Me feature enables you to accomplish tasks more efficiently and seek solutions directly within Outlook 2019. Even if you perceive yourself as proficient with the software, you can still discover methods to enhance your productivity. Tell Me retains a record of previously searched tasks, enhancing accessibility for future reference.

Enjoy a focused inbox in Microsoft Office Outlook

Outlook is not only adept at basic functions like prompting you to attach a file to your email, spell-checking, text formatting, or effortlessly inserting your digital signature, but it also provides a plethora of advanced features. One such feature is the Focused Inbox, which intelligently categorizes incoming emails into two distinct mailboxes: “Focused” and “Other”. This innovative feature aims to streamline your email experience by prioritizing important emails in the “Focused” tab, ensuring they catch your immediate attention amidst the clutter of incoming messages.

• Note: Focused Inbox replaces the old Clutter feature first introduced in Office 2013. If you’re using a perpetual version of Office 2016, there’s a possibility that you still have the Clutter feature and don’t have access to Focused Inbox. In this case, the only thing you can do to get the Focused Inbox feature upgrades to a version of Outlook that includes it, such as Outlook 2019.

Additionally, you may customize this functionality to your own preferences, so you can quickly add anything you believe belongs in a different tab. All other types of emails, including newsletters, automated messages, and promotional emails, are directed to the “Other” inbox. However, you retain the flexibility to switch between tabs effortlessly and receive notifications for emails arriving in both the “Focused” and “Other” inboxes. Additionally, you have the option to customize this feature according to your preferences. If you believe that a particular email should have appeared in a different tab, you can easily relocate it to the desired location.

Utilize your ears and voice.

With the Dictate feature, you may talk into your microphone and use speech recognition technology to automatically translate your words into text. This is one of the Office Intelligent Services that elevates voice recognition capabilities. While conversing, you can effortlessly add punctuation, revise, and proofread your writing, and you will love how quickly you can complete tasks by simply speaking.

There is an Ease of Access function that allows you to listen to your emails as well. It is complementary to Dictate since it causes Outlook to read your messages aloud. Individuals with lower ability levels can now converse far more easily than in the past. You may significantly improve your multitasking skills and productivity even if you are not disabled.

Collaborate using Office 365 Groups.

You can now join groups, start new groups, and even set up meetings on a group calendar directly from Outlook if your team or company uses Office 365 Groups. The majority of Office 265 business and enterprise programs have these groups, which greatly simplify online communication and organization. This enables distant workers to share resources including email accounts, calendars, notes, and document libraries.

Use @Mentions to get someone’s attention in Microsoft Office Outlook

Mentions should be recognizable to anyone with a social media presence on the internet. You can attract someone’s attention even while they are not using the keyboard by using the @ symbol in front of their user ID. Similar to social media, you can @Mention recipients in your communications, ensuring that everyone you tag receives a copy of your message and facilitating ongoing conversation even when you are in different time zones.

Practical Microsoft Outlook shortcuts that are essential to know

We have chosen to conclude our cheat sheet with a list of some of the most useful keyboard shortcuts for Microsoft Office Outlook that will help you work more quickly:

• To create a new email message, use Ctrl + Shift + M.
• Ctrl + A: To swiftly move or remove several messages at once, select every message in an inbox.
• Delete the chosen item(s) by pressing Ctrl + D.
• To mark an email as read, use Ctrl + Q.
• Use Ctrl + U to mark any email as unread.
• Use Ctrl + Shift + G to mark a message for later reminders for yourself.
• Ctrl + Shift + K: Launch a fresh job.
• F3: To swiftly scan through your inbox, open the search box.