Microsoft Begins Roll-Out Of New Outlook.com Design

Above theme is not the default and can be changed

Microsoft has announced today that the new design of Outlook.com is leaving preview and is in the process of rolling out worldwide. The updated design has been in testing for a significant length of time and the company finally feels confident that it is ready to replace the default layout.

If you register for a new account in the North America region, you will get the layout today, otherwise, you’ll have to wait for the features to hit your specific account but it shouldn’t be too much longer. The company says that they are rolling out the update to millions of users each week.

The new design (and underpinnings) are built on an Office 365 based infrastructure which means you get similar benefits from that service including automatically adding flights to your calendar and a smarter address book are part of this update.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_EjuAhnGUs

The update also brings improvements for those of you who use an Outlook.com account with an app on Mac or PC; setting automatic replies, toggling flags and syncing categories, inbox rules and drafts are now available.

There is improved support for working with cloud based storage services like OneDrive or Dropbox and there is now third-party add-in support too. These add-ins partners include Yelp, Wunderlist (owned by Microsoft) and Giphy; yes, you can now easily add gifs to your emails.

Overall, this is a significant update to the free email service, you can check out the video above for a quick re-cap of what is new or read the announcement post here.