Not receiving Mails on Outlook.com account?

At Bobcares, we often get requests from our customers to fix this issue as a part of our Server Management Services.

Today let’s see how our Expert Support Techs fix this Outlook issue with few quick and easy steps.

Causes for Not Receiving Mails on Outlook.com account

While working on Outlook, we often discover that we are not receiving all emails sent by others.

Some of the causes are listed below:

1. Problem with the network connection of the computer.
2. Firewall blocking the mails from coming.
3. Mails getting stored in the spam folder instead of the main inbox.
4. Email account not properly synced with Outlook.
5. Providing wrong account credentials or configuration details.
6. Outlook’s server down or the email client unavailable
7. Plugin issue in Outlook
8.  Malware corrupting Outlook data on the system.

How to fix it?

Let’s see some methods used by our Support Techs to fix this issue:

1. Check Junk Email folder

In Outlook.com folder list, choose the Junk Email folder and check if the mail we are searching is present in it.

If we find any messages marked as junk but actually is relevant we can move it to inbox.

For doing this we can right-click each email and then choose Mark as not junk.

2. Clean out the inbox

We will not receive new messages if the inbox is full.

To clear the inbox,  we can try emptying the junk folder by right-clicking Junk Email > Empty folder.

Also, we can sweep unwanted email from the inbox or archive folders.

Sweep automatically deletes all incoming email from a particular sender and keeps only the latest message.

Select a message we want to sweep and select Sweep.

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3. Check inbox filter and sort settings

If the inbox is filtering based on categories or if the sort order is different than usual we will not find the recently received messages.

Filtering and sorting are accessible at the top of the message list.

1.  Filtering: select Filter, then select what type of messages we want to see.

2. Sorting:  select Filter > Sort by

For checking the recent messages, sort by Date. And for messages from a specific person, sort by From.

4. Check Blocked senders and Safe senders lists

It is always necessary to check whether the sender is blocked if we do not receive any emails from a particular sender.

We can follow the below steps to check if the sender is blocked:

1. First go to Settings > View all Outlook settings.
2. Then select Mail, and click Junk email.

And if we see the sender’s address listed under Blocked senders and domains, select their address and then select Remove and Save.

We can add the sender’s address to Safe senders and domains if it is not in the Blocked Senders list. Email from contacts in the safe senders list will never go to the Junk Email folder.

Steps to add the sender’s address to Safe senders and domains follow are given below:

1. First go to Settings > View all Outlook settings.
2. Then select Mail, and click Junk email.
3. Enter the sender’s email address, then click Add and Save.

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5. Check the email rules

We can check the email rules to ensure that the settings are intact.

Steps to follow are given below:

1. First select Settings > View all Outlook settings.
2. Then select Mail, and click Rules.

3.  If we find any rules that are preventing us from seeing the email we want we can delete the rule.
4. For this elect the rule that we want to delete and then select Delete.
5. Finally Save the changes made.

6. Check email forwarding

We can check if email forwarding is enabled to ensure that we receive emails.

Steps to follow are:

1. Go to Forwarding settings.
2. For enabling forwarding, select Enable forwarding.

7. Remove some connected accounts

We can connect a maximum of 20 other email accounts to Outlook.com account.

If we have connected more than 20 accounts, we will not be able to send or receive messages from any of our connected accounts.

And if we notice that we are not receiving any mails we can remove some connected accounts so that the total number of connected accounts is 20 or fewer.

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8. Check the Automatic Refresh option

Generally, Outlook refreshes the inbox automatically in the background. But in case of not receiving emails on Outlook, it is necessary to check whether this option is enabled.

To do this go to the Send/Receive Group settings and turn on the automatic refresh option.

We can also change the refresh rate or refresh frequency.

9. Verify the Account Settings

To verify this, go to the account settings or choose to add our account again.

We must ensure that the email id and the password are correct.

Also, we have to check the IMAP/POP and the SMTP settings to receive/send the Outlook emails properly.

10. Disable any anti-virus or firewall application

Sometimes, a firewall or anti-malware app can also block certain network connections.

To fix this, we can temporarily disable the firewall settings on the system and check whether we are receiving the emails.

It is always safe to keep the firewall enabled. If temporarily disabling the firewall did not solve the issue we have to enable the firewall again.

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Conclusion

To conclude, we discussed various causes for not receiving mails on Outlook.com account. Also, we saw the methods used by our Support Engineers to fix this issue.