Microsoft is rolling out a new update to its productivity tools suite Outlook. The update makes it easier to manage notifications on mobile apps. The company says users will now be able to customize their notification preferences more easily. However, it doesn’t provide more details about the changes. Perhaps Outlook will give users more control over which notifications appear on their devices so they can ignore the less-important ones. We all know how quickly notifications can pile up on our smartphones if not managed properly.
“We’ve updated notifications to make it easier for you to effectively customize your settings so you can stay on top of the things that matter to you and be able to maintain a healthy work-life balance,” Microsoft said in a new post on its Microsoft 365 roadmap (via Techradar). The changes will be available to users on both Android and iOS mobile apps.
Microsoft Outlook makes managing notifications easier, more changes coming soon
In addition to this “notifications” update for the Outlook mobile apps, Microsoft is also preparing more updates for its email client. In a separate Microsoft 365 roadmap post, the company has laid out plans to introduce new working hours and location options in Outlook.
Planned to roll out later this summer (in June 2022), these features will let users set more flexible working schedules. They can individually select working hours for each day and also specify the location from where they plan to work. These additions will allow your co-workers to see when and where you are working from. This should mean fewer work-related interferences when you’re not working. These working hours and location options will only be available on the web client of Outlook though.
Another new feature coming to Microsoft Outlook is an automatic prompt when your email doesn’t meet accessibility standards. When you’re composing an email to large audiences or external users, Microsoft’s Accessibility checker will look for potential accessibility issues and help you fix them. This feature will roll out in July 2022 and will be available on the desktop platform.
Microsoft has been actively improving its Outlook offerings lately. In December last year, it rolled out text predictions for its Android email client. It suggests words or phrases that may complete your sentence when composing an email. You can ignore the suggestions or swipe on the screen to accept them. Gmail also offers a similar feature on both mobile and desktop platforms.
2022-04-09 15:06:11