This year, Outlook will undergo significant changes, marking the end of one era of Outlook and the beginning of another. The new Outlook will fully launch in 2026, significantly changing the way we create emails for Outlook. It's time to explore what the new Outlook means for email marketers and how it will change the traditional email design process, so you're prepared.
What is actually happening?
First, let's add a little context so everyone understands what we're talking about. Microsoft is slated to end the support of the old Outlook 2021 release and the New Outlook for Windows by October 13th, 2026, replacing it with the New Outlook.
Historically, the old Outlook for Windows created a lot of headaches for email marketers due to the need to individually adapt their emails for proper rendering, and some display issues could still arise.
Essentially, the New Outlook, which is more modern and user-friendly, is replacing the old Outlook for Windows to make marketers' lives easier.
Three stages of transition to New Outlook
The transition from the old Outlook to the new one is already underway, but it's happening incredibly smoothly (for which Microsoft deserves credit). There will be three phases:
- The opt-in phase, which is already underway, allows users to try out the new Outlook's features while still using the old one.
- The opt-out phase is the next phase, scheduled to begin in April 2026. During this phase, the new Outlook becomes the default, but users will still be able to revert to the old Outlook if needed.
- The cutover phase is the final phase (the date of which is not yet known), and during this phase, classic Outlook will be fully retired, meaning new installations will no longer be possible, and users will only be able to use the new Outlook.
How it was before (and partially is now)
Let's briefly discuss the old Outlook so that the changes in the New Outlook in the next section become even more compelling.
Many marketers are familiar with Outlook for Windows, which has been a big part of email marketing since 2007. Although Outlook itself was introduced even earlier, we don't need such a throwback to highlight its main feature (and imperfection).
Outlook was originally introduced as part of the Microsoft Office suite. Since then, and to this day, Outlook uses the Microsoft Word HTML rendering engine to display emails. And it's clear that this rendering method, primarily designed for displaying documents, had a difficult time rendering emails. Rendering issues, disappearing design elements, non-functional features, and much more have plagued marketers to this day. And most importantly, old Outlook didn’t work well with modern CSS, which greatly limits email creation and overall things you can implement into your email design.
Yes, we learned to adapt our emails specifically for Outlook, designing them using old methods like ghost tables that were visible for the old Outlook, inline styles, and using hacks like VML. However, eventually, this had to end.
New Outlook rendering engine explained
The new Outlook didn't appear out of nowhere, and its changes didn't just fall out of the blue. It was released in 2023, and since then, a gradual and smooth transition of users from the old Outlook to the new one has been underway. However, what, apart from the end of support for the old Outlook, could marketer to switch to the new one? The answer lies in new features.
Web-based rendering
The first (and, in our opinion, the most important) change is a new way of rendering emails. The new Outlook uses a web browser engine (similar to Outlook Web or Chromium-based) to interpret HTML and CSS. This upgrade unifies email rendering across the board and modernizes the platform to meet the needs of today's marketers.
Modern HTML and CSS support with no need for VML code, ghost tables, and more
The new rendering engine brings changes not only to the visual appearance of emails, but also under the hood.
For example, the Ghost table structure is the cornerstone of email design for the old Outlook today. The new Outlook turns the game on its head, and Ghost tables are now a thing of the past. With full HTML and CSS support, email designers have access to all modern design techniques with cleaner, less cluttered code, easier edits, and overall intuitiveness. No more Word engine inconveniences.
And remember the VML currently used for various buttons and background images? CSS now works perfectly with New Outlook, so no more VMLs are needed, making the creation of more complex and visually appealing emails much easier and closer to modern pipelines.
And that's not to mention more convenient margins and paddings coding, layouts that work just like on the web, and much more. The new Outlook makes the technical creation and support of emails for Outlook stress-free.
Better cross-platform compatibility
Currently, when opening an email in Outlook for Windows, you're highly likely not to recognize it due to rendering issues (like ignoring your margins and paddings, various alignment issues, random white lines when rendering, and so on). Meanwhile, on Outlook on the web, mobile apps, and other devices, the email will display as you intended. The Word engine is to blame, creating this inconsistency across platforms. With the old Outlook, you had to always keep this in mind and adapt your code and design to this technology in an effort to provide a consistent experience for recipients.
The new Outlook eliminates this need by providing consistent rendering, bringing it closer to what we currently see in Gmail, Apple Mail, and other email clients.
If you are still not convinced, just look at how the same email looks when opened in the old Outlook:
And here’s the same email in the New Outlook:
Tips for leading your email marketing during the Outlook transition
The main principle of your email marketing with Outlook now is to focus on the new Outlook and design emails with the new features in mind. In this regard, your email marketing will simply become the same as it is for Gmail, Apple Mail, and so on.
In our opinion, from an email design perspective, there is no difference between the Old and New Outlook. You design emails the way you need, just with the thing in mind that in the old Outlook, some of what you have planned in the design will not work, so you need to make a more simplified version for it. With the new Outlook, everything that worked in other popular email clients will now work in the New Outlook, so your life gets much easier.
Roman Burdyga,
However, while the old Outlook hasn't yet been completely retired, you should adhere to these rules that will allow you to make your emails work and display correctly within the capabilities of the old Outlook.
The arrival of the New Outlook is a really good event. The changes that come with it open up new opportunities for email marketers, and there is no need for various Outlook hacks to make emails reflect what you want. However, many users still use and will use the old Outlook. Therefore, I can’t say that tomorrow we will abandon creating emails for this version using various tricks and hacks.
Roman Burdyga,
The fallback version is your main thing in the checklist
It's hard to say when the old Outlook will be completely retired, leaving no users. Until then, a fallback version for the old Outlook will still be on your to-do list. Now, the entire email marketing process for Outlook will boil down to creating a full-fledged email version for the new Outlook, with all the HTML/CSS features, and simultaneously creating a simplified version using all the necessary life hacks for the old Outlook. Of course, no one is stopping you from simply quitting and creating emails exclusively for the new Outlook, but from a business perspective, that wouldn't be the wisest decision.
To make your recipients see only the version they need (old Outlook renders fallback, new Outlook renders a full-fledged email version), you should use conditional comments that look like this.
<!--[if mso]>
Place your old Outlook content here with tables, VMLs, and so on here.
<![endif]-->
Table layout is still your cornerstone
Emails for old Outlook simply can't be created without a table structure. As much as we'd like to see this become a thing of the past and all of us use CSS Grid and CSS Flexbox to create complex and visually appealing emails, tables are still here. They're essential for maintaining compatibility with the old Outlook.
Besides that, you can use tables in the New Outlook if you desire, as they work and render perfectly fine in the updated version. Old Outlook stands for mandatory table structure; the New Outlook stands for optional table structure.
Basic CSS only
Along with tables, the limitations associated with CSS don't go away. While you maintain compatibility with the old Outlook, your hands are practically tied, and you're limited to the simple CSS capabilities for design customization. Simple paddings, background colors, and fonts are all you have at your disposal. But don't forget, you always have the new Outlook, where you can unleash your creativity and utilize CSS to its full potential.
Test thoroughly
You're all professional marketers, and you know this, but we'd like to remind you that email testing is a necessary step in creating any email, especially for Outlook. This hasn't changed with the arrival of the new Outlook, and you need to test every email before sending it to Outlook to ensure both the old and new versions render your design as intended.
For example, in Stripo, you can use the Email on Acid integration and test your email in all Outlook versions on all possible devices in just a few clicks.
Simply click Test and select Email Clients.
The integration will automatically test and show how the email will display in a given email client or device.
You can select the required Outlook version to ensure recipients see your email as you intended.
Wrapping up
The new Outlook is a necessary and beneficial step for email marketing, opening up new opportunities for marketers and making their lives easier. With the new Outlook, email creation will be on par with other email clients and in step with the times. Email rendering issues caused by the current Outlook will also disappear.
Marketers using Outlook now have access to all modern technologies for creating complex emails that will fully unleash their creativity and meet all necessary marketing needs. The main thing for marketers to do now is to take into account the specifics of the old Outlook to create the necessary fallbacks for those who still use it, ensuring a good experience for these recipients.
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