- May 7, 2019
-
Maryann Dobrowolski
- 3 min
Microsoft Outlook has a ton of amazing features that are often overlooked (because there are so many). One that people often miss is “Delayed Delivery”. This feature allows you to compose an email to be sent at a later date or time as you wish, which is great for sending reminders, emailing at specific times, or lowering exceptions on your response time. That last one is a joke — or is it?
Delayed Delivery in Outlook 2019
Start by composing an email as you normally would. Fill in the subject, body, etc.
Select the “Options” tab in the email window’s toolbar:
The “Delay Delivery” button is located to the right side of the ribbon, in the “More Options” section:
Click the icon and a new pop-up window will appear containing a variety of options. Locate the “Do not deliver before” option in the Delivery Options section of the window – it will automatically default to a time in the near future.
Change the date by either typing in a new date or clicking the drop-down menu and selecting the day and time you want to the email to be sent:
Once you’ve set a delivery day and time, click “Close” to close the window. The “Delay Delivery” option will now be a darker color, indicating that the setting is in use.
Finally, click “Send” as usual to finalize the email and it will be sent at the time you’ve specified.
Locating Delayed Emails
If you have a need to edit or delete an email scheduled for a delayed send, you just need to know where to find it. Delayed emails that have not yet been sent are located in your Outlook “outbox” folder.
To edit an email, simply open it as usual, make any necessary changes, and then click “Send.” The email is scheduled for a delayed delivery, and will remain in your inbox until it is ready to be sent.
Deleting Delayed Emails
To delete the email entirely, you have to open the email and disable delayed delivery by unchecking the “Do not deliver before” option.
Tip: Deleting a scheduled email by clicking the delete button will send the item to your deleted items folder. Emails in this folder with delayed delivery options will still be sent, so be sure to remove any delayed delivery options from emails you wish to permanently delete.
This feature is currently only available in in the desktop version of Outlook, but I expect to see the functionality in mobile apps and webmail in the future – it’s just too useful of a feature to limit to desktops! Give it a try the next time you need to send an email on the weekend but don’t want to set the precedent of working off the clock.
