How to Edit a Received Email in Outlook 365

How to Edit a Received Email in Outlook 365

Outlook 365, part of the Microsoft 365 suite, offers a range of features for managing and organizing your emails, calendars, and contacts. One feature that many users may not know about is the ability to edit a received email. While Outlook doesn’t allow you to directly edit the content of an email once it has been received (for security reasons), it does offer some workarounds to make modifications for personal use or to track important information. In this guide, we will walk you through the steps of how to edit a received email in Outlook 365.

Why You Might Want to Edit a Received Email

There are several reasons why you might want to edit a received email:

• Clarifying Information: You may want to highlight or make notes on specific sections of the email for future reference.
• Responding with Context: If you plan to reply or forward the email, you might want to adjust or reword parts of the original email.
• Internal Use: Sometimes, you may need to reformat or summarize a received email to share it within your team or organization.

Method 1: Copying the Email and Editing in a New Draft

While you can’t directly edit the received message, you can copy its contents into a new draft email and edit it freely. Here’s how you can do it:

Step-by-Step Process:

1. Open the Email: Go to your inbox and open the email that you want to edit.
2. Copy the Email Content: Highlight the entire content of the email (or select only the parts you want to edit), right-click, and choose Copy.
3. Create a New Draft: In the left-hand menu of Outlook 365, click on New Email or the New Message button to open a new email draft.
4. Paste the Email: In the new email draft, right-click in the body of the email and choose Paste (or press Ctrl + V on your keyboard).
5. Edit the Content: Now you can freely edit the email content as needed, whether it’s correcting information, adding notes, or summarizing parts of the original message.
6. Save or Send: Once you’ve made your changes, you can either save the edited email as a draft or send it to the intended recipients.

Benefits of This Method:

• Full control over the content of the email.
• Allows for comments or personal notes to be added to the message.
• Easy to forward or reply to the edited content.

Method 2: Using Notes or Comments to Edit in the Original Message

If you don’t need to completely change the contents of an email but would like to annotate it or add context for future reference, you can use the Notes feature in Outlook or leave comments within the email itself.

Adding Notes in Outlook 365:

1. Open the Email: Open the received email you want to annotate.
2. Open the Email in a Separate Window: To access additional features, it’s often easier to open the email in a separate window by clicking the Pop Out icon in the upper-right corner.
3. Use the Notes Feature: Outlook doesn’t have a built-in comment feature like Google Docs, but you can use the OneNote integration for annotations. Right-click the email and choose OneNote > Send to OneNote. Once the email is in OneNote, you can add notes, highlights, or commentary on the content.
4. Refer Back to Notes: If you’re looking to recall the changes later, you can always open OneNote where the email is saved, or simply refer back to the original email with your notes on top.

Benefits of This Method:

• Keeps the original email intact while allowing you to add your own thoughts.
• Easy access to notes when needed, especially for tracking important details.
• The email remains unchanged, preserving the original message integrity.

Method 3: Forwarding the Email with Modifications

Another approach to editing a received email is by forwarding it with modifications. This allows you to send the edited version to others while retaining the original message as a reference.

Step-by-Step Process:

1. Open the Received Email: Navigate to your inbox and open the email you’d like to forward.
2. Click Forward: At the top of the email window, select the Forward button.
3. Edit the Body: Before you send the email, you can delete sections, add new text, or rewrite parts of the email. You can also add new content in the body of the forwarded message.
4. Send the Forwarded Email: After you’ve made your changes, enter the recipient’s email address and click Send.

Benefits of This Method:

• Allows for easy communication of edited information without altering the original email.
• Useful for sharing information with additional context or clarifications.
• The original email thread is preserved for reference.

Method 4: Using the “Edit Message” Feature (For Exchange Accounts)

If you are using an Exchange email account, Outlook offers a feature that allows you to edit sent emails within your own mailbox. This is primarily used for editing messages you have sent (for example, correcting typos in emails you’ve already sent), but it doesn’t allow for editing received emails. However, if the message was part of an ongoing thread and you’re working on a shared mailbox, you may have some ability to update the content.

Important Note:

The “Edit Message” feature is available only for emails that you have sent or for emails stored in a shared mailbox. It does not work for emails that you’ve received.

Conclusion

Although Outlook 365 doesn’t allow you to directly edit a received email, there are several effective ways to modify or annotate email content based on your needs. Whether you choose to copy and paste the email into a new draft, add notes via OneNote, forward the message with modifications, or utilize Exchange features, you can manage and adjust your email content to suit your requirements.

By using these methods, you can work with received emails in a way that supports your workflow, ensures accuracy, and facilitates collaboration with others.