Setup Email Forwarding in Outlook 365: Informative Guide

Suppose you are an employee in an organization and want somebody else to receive emails in your absence. There might be a time when a user wants to forward mail based on the criteria. There is also a case where a user wants to set up automatic forwarding for a shared mailbox in Outlook 365. Here you’ll discover solutions for all the queries outlined earlier.

It allows sending email messages from one mailbox to the destination mailbox inside or outside of the organization. It is one of the helpful tools for correctly organizing emails and allowing users to easily duplicate all incoming email messages by sending them to another email address.

Table of Content

• How to Set Up Email Forwarding in Outlook 365?
• How to Enable Email Forwarding in Outlook (Windows)?
• Why Users Avoid Email Forwarding in Outlook 365?
• Alternative Solution for Email Forwarding
• Let’s Conclude

How to Set Up Email Forwarding in Outlook 365?

Readers can follow these steps to perform the task in Outlook 365.

1. Login to Microsoft Admin Center.
2. Under the Users tab, click the Active Users option.
3. Click the Add users option, (list of all users displayed on screen.) Select the user name whose email address you want to forward.
4. A section appears to the left, select the “Mail” tab under the selected user account panel.
5. Click on ‘Manage email forwarding’.
6. Click on the checkbox “Forward all emails sent to this mailbox”. Then press enter.

How to Enable Email Forwarding in Outlook (Windows)?

Outlook supports automatic email forwarding, allowing users to redirect incoming emails to another email address or address without manual intervention. 

1. Open Outlook, click Settings  > Options > Organize Email > Inbox Rules.
2. Under the Inbox rules tab, click the arrow next to the plus symbol +
3.  Select the “Create a new rule for arriving messages” option.
4. A panel opens select the “Apply to all messages” option.
5. Click the More Options button, then select any one option Forward, Redirect, or Send. 
6. Select any one option “Forward the message to” or “Forward the message as an attachment to“.
7. Select the address you want to transfer mail by double-clicking on it in the address book view. 
8. Click OK to save your selections and return to the new rule window.
9. Click on the save option.

Also read: How to Transfer Office 365 Mailbox to Another Account? Best Way Explained

Why Users Avoid Email Forwarding in Outlook 365?

Email forwarding in Outlook 365 can be useful as a backup because it duplicates the message to the source account before forwarding the email. Many Companies admin use email forwarding to reduce workload by splitting the incoming emails to their employees’ accounts. But at the same time, it raises the security threats risk and information overloading issues which makes it difficult to manage the emails.

When the admin sets email forwarding to one of its users, it increases the chance of security breaches during the forwarding process. Suppose one user gets a spam email and is forwarded to another user due to email forwarding. Let’s take another example, thousands of emails are forwarded daily to an admin, and because of this old emails are lost.  This is why many users avoid email forwarding in companies and large businesses.

Alternative Solution for Email Forwarding

To perform easy and quick email forwarding without any old email loss or information overloading, you can opt Wizard Office 365 Migration tool, This tool is secure and reliable to migrate emails with attachments, and it also ensures protection against data loss.

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It provides a robust process to migrate emails and with other functionalities such as:

• Migrate data including Emails, Contacts, Calendars, Tasks, Categories, and Documents.
• Allow users to import CSV files to add Microsoft 365 source or destination accounts.
• Office 365 In-Place Archive Mailbox Migration helps in maintaining folder hierarchy.
• Allow Delta & Re-Run Migration feature.
• Generate a Summary Report after the process is done.
• Support Category Migration such as priority-based.
• Multiple Project Migration feature is also enabled for users.

ALso read : Office 365 Tenant to Tenant Migration Simplified with Comprehensive Solution

Let’s Conclude

Email forwarding in Outlook 365 can be beneficial but at the same time also raises risks. For setting up forwarding in Outlook, you need to add rules before applying to multiple addresses. Some users avoid forwarding in Outlook because of the risks, if you are also finding an alternative solution,  then an automated migration tool would be a better choice.

Frequently Asked Queries

Q1. Can I set up email forwarding for specific types of messages?

Yes, you can set up forwarding for specific types of messages by creating rules for the specific condition.

Q2. Is there a limit to the number of email messages I can forward messages to?

Yes, there is a limit to forwarding email messages and it varies based on your subscription plan and other factors.

Q3. What happens if the forwarded email address becomes unavailable or the message is rejected?

If the email addresses become unavailable or the message is rejected Microsoft Office 365 generates a Non-Delivery Report (NDR) to notify the sender.