Switch from 'new' Outlook (2023) to 'classic' outlook

Anonymous

I need to go back to the Classic version because the 'new' Outlook lacks some features that I need for work.

This webpage https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/getting-started-with-the-new-outlook-for-windows-656bb8d9-5a60-49b2-a98b-ba7822bc7627 states "You can switch back whenever you want, just switch the toggle off in the new Outlook and it will automatically open the classic version."

There is no toggle. Is there any other way I can undo this update and go back to the previous version?

EDIT: Moved FROM Microsoft 365 Insider / Outlook / Windows TO Outlook / Outlook for Windows / For business.

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Anonymous

Once flipped on, the toggle is irrelevant since the "old" version still exists. Just run it. You should still be able to find its shortcut in Start (and wherever else you might have had it before), but if not you will see outlook.exe in one of these places (may vary slightly depending on edition), so if necessary make a new shortcut:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16

or here:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16

The nice thing about the New Outlook is that it's not an either/or proposition (like New Teams is). You have both old and new. You can even run them concurrently.

But if running that actually runs New Outlook for you (some have reported that's the case), then either:

Uninstall Outlook

run Regedit.exe and go here (or the same with 15.0, if you don't have 16.0):

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Preferences

And in that you will see UseNewOutlook

Set it to 0, which means that running old Outlook actually runs it.

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177 additional answers

Anonymous

2023-05-15T16:00:58+00:00

But if I uninstall Outlook then how would I run old Outlook? My licence is for the Office Pro 2016 suite that I bought a few years ago but the actual Office software was downloaded. If I were to download afresh, Microsoft would only allow me to download the new version. Indeed, I think that when I ran the online Office Repair, it downloaded the newest version and overwrote all traces of the previous version.
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Anonymous

2023-05-15T16:17:17+00:00

No, that directory you showed is not where New Outlook is located. New Outlook exists in a completely different area, under (Program Files, Windows Apps) and is just a Store app essentially. It can readily be uninstalled, and at that point whatever weird sway it has over your normal Outlook should go away.

As for what Office Repair might have done, it would be strange if it upgraded your version, since it's meant to repair the version that you have. But if it did, you can deal with that after getting rid of New Outlook, since without doing that you can't run any other version of Outlook.
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Anonymous

2023-05-15T16:27:00+00:00

I see what you mean. However, if I open the Outlook.exe from the C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16 directory, new Outlook opens. This implies that the Outlook.exe in the directory is the new version, does it not? Apologies if I am being dense!
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Anonymous

2023-05-15T16:38:37+00:00

No, that's a reasonable assumption, but it's just a result of some kind of behind-the-scenes trickery going on, Microsoft's way of ensuring you run New Outlook (once you've toggled it on) even if you run the shortcut for the old one. Otherwise, many would use their normal Outlook shortcut and get the old version when they really wanted the new one.
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