outlook.live.com not showing external images in messages

[mikeblas]

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?

[#2]

@martinversteeg 

This worked for me as well. Thank you for sharing,

[#3]

arrange messages by conversation is an ingenious workaround, but it's not for me... it messes up how I organize things and the conversation mode is counterproductive for me. mikeblas seems to be on to something when he found the blocked display code. Microsoft should just fix it... but they seem to be ignoring the problem...

[#4]

@martinversteeg This worked for me as well. Thank you for sharing.
Another thing they broke is creating a new subfolder in the left pane. Create a subfolder, give it a name and it shows up blank. You need to rename it and the name will stick.
They must have some new, unexperienced, programmer working on Outlook Online.

Don't they test anything before releasing it? Where is the quality control?

[#5]

@mikeblas thank you for starting this string! This is happening to me as well. Images are appearing on my iOS phone. 

[#6]

Same here (and everywhere)... Fix your mess Microsoft!

[#7]

Following because I'm having the same issues.

[#8]

I'm having the same problem. I can't see any images in my email messages. I went through all my outlook settings and nothing fixes it. (I refuse to use Conversation View as a fix - it's the worst!) I don't have any chrome extensions causing a blockage that I can tell. I have a paid subscription (an old MSN account), so they darn well better fix this.

[#9]

This started for me TODAY 9-22-21 - I will follow this thread - I will try the workaround - but as several said - It messes up my whole system and I work and make my living via email - so....

[#10]

This just started maybe 12pm central today. Images were loading fine all morning then boom.

[#11]

Experiencing the same issue as of yesterday.

[#12]

@mikeblas 

I too have spent too long trying different settings over the past week.

My Desktop MS Office Pro 2016 Outlook shows all the graphics, so it's just the mail server with issues as everyone is saying. Treated like junk mail? Something has gone on with the spam/junk mail, now instead of 20 ~ 50 a day, it's 150 ~ 200+ a day. Can't phone, so junk email? Overwhelmed the system, I bet.

[#13]

@Retired18, I've noticed a very large number of spam/junk messages suddenly as well. About the same time messages no longer displayed graphics in HTML formatted emails. Most of the spam emails have random cryptic characters/numbers appended to the end of the subject line, so they are easy to identify and delete immediately.

Coincidence? Hmm... I think not. Methinks Microsoft has a problem on their hands. Their mail system is seriously broken, their spam identifiers are broken, and they can no longer process HTML-formatted emails correctly. Forcing users into "conversation" mode is not UX-friendly.

[#14]

@maryberk Interesting - I had not tried my phone, which works fine. And as someone else mentioned, it works fine on my Outlook 2016 email program - just not on the web. Hope they get it fixed.

[#15]

@mikeblas SAME on w/ either Edge, Chrome or Firefox running Big Sur 11.5 on an Intel Mac. 

WTF Microsoft, the silence is deafening. I thought you were trying to rehabilitate your image as the giant d**kh***s of the technology universe? 

[#16]

@mikeblas   I'm expericieng the same thing and so far have gotten little help from Microsoft. You'd think the giant corporation would move quickly to get this resolved.

[#17]

Yesterday (9/20) absolutely NO issues viewing my images whether I was using Chrome, Edge, or Chrome on iPhone, even Safari on iPhone. Today? Issues. I tried forwarding the email, and issues showed up. Shows up in the apps, not in the browser. As much as I detest conversation view, switched and it worked. Kudos to the person who figured it out. Images returned. Staying hopeful that Microsoft doesn't mess that up. I am curious as to why that is - conversation view has images, yet the other way doesn't? That is definitely a Microsoft error. But, glad everything is working out.

[#18]

Same ole thang over here @aileverte 

[#19]

@mikeblas 

Same issue here. I hope they fix it soon, because I absolutely hate conversation view.

[#20]

Hi everyone.

I am also having the same issue. It just started today (09/22).
Following this conversation.

[#21]

Ditto. Turned on Conversations and it's fixed. Hate Conversations view, ugh.