outlook.live.com not showing external images in messages

Copper Contributor

 

I can't get outlook.live.com to show images. I'm using an ancient account -- msn.com migrated to outlook.com, if that matters. But I also have an Office 365 subscription I'm using the service in a desktop browser.

 

Up to a few weeks ago, things were fine. But now mailing lists that I subscribe to (like Harbor Freight Tools advertisements, or The Wall Street Journal, or Redfin search matches, or ...) aren't showing images. This makes email pretty much unusable, since there's no UI to explicitly allow images for that email message.

 

I've added the email sender to my contacts and to safe senders. The mailing list is known to Outlook in the options -- seems like that's allowed, too.

 

When I try to search for this issue, I end up hitting answers from 2012 which describe settings and menus that aren't in my UI.

 

How can I get images to load? Why did they break?

 

I tried digging a bit deeper:

 

I'm looking at a message in the browser that has blocked images. If I'm looking at the message itself, I see this HTML for one of the blocked images:

<img data-imagetype="External" blockedimagesrc="https://assets.bounceexchange.com/assets/uploads/users/4035/042221/HarborFreight/tc1-155.jpg" width="155" alt="automotive" class="x_width_95" style="display:block; margin:0 auto; border:0; white-space:pre; text-align:center">


but if I view the message's original source (using three dots / view / message source) then I find this HTML for the same image:

 

<img src="https://assets.bounceexchange.com/assets/uploads/users/4035/042221/HarborFreight/tc1-155.jpg" width="155" style="display:block;margin=:0 auto;border:0;white-space:pre;text-align:center;" alt="automotive" class="width_95">


So it's very clear that outlook.live.com is translating the HTML and blocking the image deliberately. How can I make it stop doing that?

 

 

 

72 Replies

Hi Microsoft team, 

Based on a thread on Reddit, I think we are many folks who are having this same issue as described by mikeblas. It started last week for many of us from what I can see. I logged a Ticket with Microsoft Outlook team but so far no luck with a fix. 

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/Outlook/comments/pqf4q0/outlooklivecom_not_showing_images/

@mikeblas I'm having the same issue. It was fine but for the last few week all images are broken and there's no option to 'show images.' I was waiting patiently for Microsoft to fix this but they don't seem to care.

 

Solution (workaround):

Unfortunately, most emails are useless without images, so I set up a new gmail account and have outlook forward all my email to there. The images show up there. It's be better if MS fixed the issue, but, in the meantime, I can still read my emails.

Following this conversation as I'm having a similar issue

I am experiencing the same issue. Images have not been showing now for roughly 1 week. Microsoft - let's get this fixed. Something was updated recently and that is why this situation has arisen. 

Broken for me on a range of OS/hardware/browsers the last few days though strangely when attempting to reply to an email it displays all the missing images, also the mobile app on my Android devices works fine too. There's been a range of mysterious bugs/features appearing in the website version of Outlook the last few years but this one is a real spirit crusher.

Exactly the same thing for me, and it's been about a week now. All images are blocked on outlook.com (but are fine when I reply or forward the message). On my Android phone, messages display perfectly fine. 

I cannot find a setting anywhere that enables viewing of these images. I would expect these to be disabled in my JUNK folder. But NOT in my Inbox.


@Microsoft, please escalate this issue. I've kept this email and my paid account going for years because it was a (previous) account used for my business. If not resolved, I'll be forced to just stop using this account and move everything to another email account.

...sue

 

@ have same issue and it was changing not over night. 1) to open first email I had to do it twice. 2) images dissappears around 21st of September. 3)I did not run any updates, so it's MSFT issue 4) same behaviour in all browsers, regardless which OS is used.

I think is must be some new setting in outlook.live.com because I have the problem when using my main account in any computer, but other accounts in those same computers show the images without any problem.

I agree with everyone. It is a Microsoft issue. If I forward the emails to Yahoo or to Gmail, everything works fine and I can see all of the images.

 

Thing is - we can complain about this forever. I would rather do something productive. Does Microsoft read our posts? If not, how do we communicate our concern to people at Microsoft so they can fix it?

same problem here. from another thread there is a work-around that is better than getting gmail: enable conversations and the images will show. worked for me.

I don't like conversation view, but rather tolerate it over no images which is horrible.

@mikeblas RETAILate! today 9/21 if by Oct 1st its not fixed - place messages everywhere you can, especially on websites of those who pays for ads on hotmail, also yahoo stock, reddit, instagram, facebook, reddit, everywhere! And I am sure MSFT will make it work not just on cell phones.

Hello! Your idea works - I just tried it. I don't like Conversation View either, but I agree - at least we can now see the images. Thank you!
Woks, but again... why we should suffer? Why those Apple, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo can change what works whet we like? Why?

@mikeblas Yep, same thing here def a microsoft issue.  I use the old hotmail account now Outlook.com, but I've had it for 20 years.  Open an email NO images.  

 

Also, something else...when I delete an email, instead of going back to my inbox after the email is deleted, it opens the next email automatically!  Anyone else have this issue?  Maybe this part of the Microsoft image issue in this thread?

@martinversteegThanks so much. That did the trick. (enabling conversation view in settings) It was so irritating.

 

 

@apratt am following this too - just started yesterday.

Wow - yuck, but at least it works. Jeez. :(
Following this too. Conversation mode might resolve the issue but I hate that mode. First thing I always do is turn it off. So that's not really an answer for me.
I'm having the same issue. Tried in different browsers, same thing.