Today Microsoft announced an update to its Android Outlook.com application, including server-side search, improved offline mail storage, colors, vacation replies, and aliases.
Outlook.com, a key project for Microsoft, has over 400 million users. The successor to Hotmail, Outlook.com is Microsoft’s mail vision for all mobile platforms. According to Microsoft, 68% of Outlook.com users hit up their digital missives from their mobile device, so having a strong application set matters.
If you are an Outlook,com and Android user, this update will contain at least a few things that you like. You can now sync all your mail to your device, if you want to burn the storage capacity. If you want to be able to find any message you want, but not download the lot, Microsoft has added server-side search to the Android app. A different question: How did it not have that feature before?
Microsoft has also added a new color set to the app, and introduced support for aliases, along with vacation replies. Taken altogether, the Android now appears to be a fully functional mail experience. I can’t imagine what using it previously was like. Before, over more than 10,000 ratings, Microsoft accrued a rating on the Play store of under three stars.
You can download the app here. If you think that the addition of color is a minor update, by the way, you are picking an argument with Yahoo, who recently rolled out color changes to its Mail experience. Apparently it matters.
Final note: The top three webmail experiences continue to nibble around the edges. When is someone going to reinvent this damn plague we call email?
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