Update on Focused Inbox rollout for Outlook 2016 for Windows users

Microsoft

Edited: Nov 10, 2017 with updated information. 

 

Focused Inbox is coming to an Outlook near you! Here is an update on our status for Outlook 2016 for Windows. If you want to see our latest for other platforms, see our blog post, as these details haven’t changed.

 

Note: we have provided admins the ability to control the rollout of Focused Inbox in their organizations. For more details, read our blog post on admin controls.

 

Rollout status

As a reminder, there is a client and service side component required for Focused Inbox to appear in Outlook. The user’s mailbox in Office 365 & Outlook.com must receive a service side update to be Focused Inbox enabled. Secondly, the user must have a build of Outlook that includes the client-side updates necessary for Focused Inbox to appear.

 

Service side status:

We deployed to 100% of Office 365 (Exchange Online) and Outlook.com mailboxes. This is no longer a factor in availabilty.  

 

Client side status:

There are a few client side requirements:

  • Requires build 16.0.7967.2xxx+.  
    • This build began rolling out on April 21, 2017 to the Monthly (formerly Current) Channel for Office 365 ProPlus as Version 1703.
    • Those using a Semi-Annual (formerly Deferred) Channel build will not have access to this feature right now, as those channels offer delayed access to builds. Semi-Annual Channel will get Focused Inbox in 2018. 
  • Currently, the feature requires Office 365 modern authentication be enabled.
  • Previous use of Clutter
    • To ensure a good experience for those who previously used Clutter, user may get Focused Inbox rolled out in a defaulted-off state. See the chart in the “Transition from Clutter” section of our blog post.

 

186 Replies

This isn't the issue. You can still meet all the public requirements for Focused Inbox (version 1703 and above, modern authentication, and enabled for your tenant) and still not have it. This problem is that FI in only available for certain release channels, with no advanced notice at all (until this thread) of when the main release channels will get it.

Hey Reef - thanks for elaborating. You are correct, we had a service incident (which you can track in the Office 365 Service Health Dashboard) where some tenants saw Clutter turned off at the end of last week. That has been fixed. I apologize about the issue. You didn't get a proactive comm on this as it wasn't intentional nor expected. Going forward, the Message Center remains the best place to stay up to date on what is happening for Focused Inbox. You do not need to follow our blogs or this community forum.

As for getting Outlook 2016 working, it will work assuming you meet these requirements:
using Office 365 version of Office, on Monthly Channel, up to date, connected to an Exchange Online mailbox using Modern Authentication. That last requirement is the tricky one for most, and is being removed by the end of the year.
Sorry for the pain Scott. You didn't see a comm in the MC since this wasn't a practice or planned change, but rather a service incident. That did start on the 26th/27th last week. The fix was rolled out, it should be resolved now.

I'm sorry to hear that your ambassador hasn't been too helpful. Luckily you came to the right place - I work on the product team and know what is going on. Clutter will eventually go away, but not in the short term. Likely a couple years. We will keep it going until we are fully rolled out in Outlook for Windows. We will make an announcement in the Office 365 Message Center when we have an officially published timeline.

For modern auth, we are going to remove that requirement for Monthly Channel users in the next couple months. So if you aren't ready to enable Modern Auth broadly, you will still be able to get the feature here soon.
I agree, and I can tell you that everyone at Microsoft also agrees. As you note however, our execution hasn't been perfect and there have been times where something missed (for a variety of reasons). We are working to ensure that doesn't happen. But we are in agreement that the Message Center is the location.
Hey Jeff, sorry for the confusion. The note about it being only there for Monthly Channel was in the original Message Center post. We will have another post there shortly when we get rid of the modern auth requirement, then again in march when we go to Semi-Annual channel.

Hey Today i started my outlook 2016 and i noticed the inbox for @hotmail.com account suddenly had the focused inbox enabled, however the button to disable it, is not visible under view so i added it myselve to a new group by editing the ribbon. However the button is always disabled and i'm unable to disable focussed inbox on my consumer hotmail.com account. 

 

How can i disable this focused inbox again i don't want that ? I now see priority and other tabs in my inbox and i want it gone. Googling this problem does not provide any information.

 

you can see a screenshot of it here https://imgur.com/z5YqXd6

If you disable it in Outlook.com options, does the change sync to Outlook? 

https://outlook.live.com/owa/?path=/options/focusedinbox

No it had no impact, but i figured out the problem.

 

I temporary added my hotmail account to my outlook 2016 at work to test something but at work i'm using insider versions of office 2016 and thus outlook 2016. In the insider version the option to enable / disable focussed inbox on hotmail / outlook.com addresses is not greyed out. It must have changed something server sided, because at home i'm not using an insder version of outlook 2016 and could not disable it. So i suscribed to insider versions at home as well updated my office / outlook 2016 and i now had the option to disable focussed inbox.

 

It seem's we have to watch out which accounts we add to insider versions as it seems to save certain things server sided (like in this case) with no option to turn it back off (unless you also install an insider version)

Yeah, the build matters, but if it's supported client side, the option to turn it off should be client side too. 

Why is this only accessible on ProPlus, and not on the Office 365 Home edition of Outlook 2016?

When can we expect it for the Home edition?

Hey Patrick - sorry for the confusion. It is available for all versions of Office 365 - ProPlus, Business, Home and Personal. I typically use ProPlus in this thread as this is a commercial customer forum, so that is what most people are familiar with. 

 

Just remember, as noted in the original post here, that Focused Inbox is a service-side feature in addition to a client side feature. Meaning, you need to be using an Exchange Online mailbox in order for this to work. 

 

We are in the process of enabling for Outlook.com mailboxes...those will work in 16.0.8730 Version 1711. 

Thanks for the response! Strange enough, I have Version 1710 (updated from 1709 yesterday), and I cannot get Focused Inbox to work/show, on two Office 365 business accounts nor Outlook.com
However the Mail app in Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, as well as the web versions and the Mobile versions give me access to Focused Inbox.
1711 - sorry typo. Thanks for your patience, so close!

Thanks, i'm on 1711 insiders build now and finally have Focused Inbox, oh happy day!

So I'm on version 1708 Semi Annual Targeted.  I meet the Outlook version requirement, but it looks like you need to be on the Monthly channel to see the Focused Inbox. 

 

At what point will Semi Annual or Semi Annual Targeted installs (which I imagine is a large percentage of Enterprise users) be enabled for the Focused inbox?  And how does enabling Focused Inbox for the Office 365 tenant in Powershell affect us right now?  Does it not matter unless we switched to Monthly Channel?

 

Thanks for any guidance you can provide.

It will come to Targeted in March of 2018, then Semi-Annual the next release after that. Those builds provide customer a slower update path from Monthly, which is why you haven't received the update yet.

Messing with FI won't effect the feature in Outlook 2016 until you are on Monthly channel or the feature comes to Semi-Annual. It will enable/disable the feature in the web, in Outlook for Mac, etc.

Lets be honest, Microsoft has done a horrible job with this focus based inbox roll out.

First off i hat the fact that i am now forced to use outlook clients an all devices, some users specially IOS ones like the native client which does not support the focused inbox. Then they go and discontinue clutter without providing notice for hosted clients last weekend. Little to no docs on it available on how to troubleshoot this. Whats sad is that it works great on MAC office version or IOS outlook client but they cant get it right on their own windows versions. Worked 2 hrs with support to get it fixed with no luck. So that tells you there is issues. One would expect that if you move from cluter to focused inbox you give users a transition period to make sure it works before you force it down their throat. But i guess this is to much to think of at the new Microsoft.

On that topic, are the focused or other messages tagged so one can write a rule to move it to a folder ? 

 

I can also verify that Clutter stopped working for our entire tenant with no warning or explanation, and no action taken by us.  We're on the deferred channel, Version 1705 Build 16.0.8201.2209 with no FI.

 

Terrible communication from MS here.

Ditto Alex on this one.  Communication has been terrible, but the decision underlying to abandon Clutter which then eliminates all non-Outlook mail apps is unforgivable given the lack of development and features the mobile Outlook apps contain.