Email link in Outlook

Add an email link with Insert Hyperlink

Microsoft's steps apply to Outlook for Microsoft 365, Outlook 2024, 2021, 2019 and 2016 on Windows:

1. In your message, select the text or picture that should be the link.
2. On the Insert tab, select Link, then Insert Link. You can also right-click the text and choose Link.
3. Under Link to, click E-mail Address.
4. Type the address in the E-mail address box, or pick one from Recently used e-mail addresses.
5. Type a subject in the Subject box if you want one.
6. Select OK.

Microsoft adds a caution here: some web browsers and email programs might not recognise the subject line. Test the link if the subject matters.

There's an even quicker way for a plain address. Type it in the message, such as someone@example.com, and Outlook turns it into a link that opens a blank email.

Add a body, cc or bcc

The Insert Hyperlink box stops at the subject. To pre-fill the message itself, build the whole mailto link and paste it as the address:

1. Fill in the tool below: address, subject, body, and cc or bcc if you need them.
2. Copy the Mailto link.
3. In Outlook, select your text, choose Insert > Link > Insert Link, and this time paste the link into the Address box under Existing File or Web Page.

The tool encodes the text the way RFC 6068, the mailto standard, asks: spaces as %20 and line breaks as %0D%0A. Outlook and the reader's mail app then show the body as separate lines, not one run-on paragraph.

Make Outlook open email links

If clicking a mailto link opens a different mail app, or nothing, Windows is sending email links somewhere else. Microsoft's steps:

1. Open Settings, then Apps, then Default apps.
2. Type MAILTO in the search box. Microsoft says you can search for a link type there as well as a file type.
3. Select it and choose Outlook.

If you use Outlook on the web in a browser instead, the browser decides. Our guide to mailto links that don't work covers Chrome's setting for that.

Email links in your signature

The same link works in a signature. Give it its own subject, such as "Enquiry from your signature", and you can see which emails came from it.

What the reader sees

When someone clicks your link, their own mail app opens a new message. Nothing is sent until they press send. RFC 6068 says mail apps should show the full message before sending, so they can check the To line and edit the text.

Two things to keep in mind:

• Bcc isn't hidden in the link. Anyone who looks at the link can read the bcc addresses. Keep bcc for your own use, not in links you send widely.
• Keep the body short. A few prompts, like "Order number:" and "What happened:", work better than a full letter and keep the link a manageable length.

Outlook on the web and the new Outlook

Microsoft's Insert Hyperlink steps above are written for the desktop app. In other versions, paste the full mailto link from the tool wherever you add a link, then send yourself a test message and click it before you send it to anyone else.

For the syntax behind subjects and bodies, read mailto link with subject and body.