Outlook 2016 doesn't accept password or app password

Hi Frubbl - I totally understand your frustration with the changes. With that being said as a paying customer of Microsoft 365, nothing changes with those apps and services. Outlook that comes with Microsoft 365 continues to work and supports OAuth via Outlook.com Syncing. You also continue to get all of the added benefits like Ad Free experience and additional storage for your mailbox and OneDrive.

Sadly we are unable to comment or force a vendor to start using a more Modern Auth mechanism. This change that we are doing to eventually retire Basic Auth is not unique to Microsoft. In fact Google has already completed their deprecation of Basic auth/Less Secure Apps, and we know a variety of other ISPs that are in the same process. This change that all are going through is truly for the safety and benefit of all of the users.

So the best suggestion that I would have is to start discussions with BlackBerry to see if they are planning or will be supporting more current forms of Auth. This is the same way that apps like Apple Mail, Google Mail, and Thunderbird all have started to support OAuth in the past years.

David --

Would you please explain why connections work for a few days and then stop working? Is Microsoft continuing to fix the mess it created with this ill-conceived change to authentication? Will MS provide compensation for the month+ that the services users pay for are unavailable to them via the devices and apps they (we/I) have used for years without issue? It would be helpful to know whether we can rely on MS to provide users their paid services or if we should find alternatives.

Thanks

Hi David,

As a vendor (Morgen Calendar) this change is very concerning.

1. As far as I know, this was not clearly communicated in advanced.
2. Our calendar client is based on the EWS API for which OAuth does not work. We would love to get rid of Basic auth as well, but Microsoft is not providing a mechanism to use OAuth with EWS. What is more frustrating is that Microsoft and Apple are able to use EWS+OAuth but this seems to be enabled only on those specific client ids, which leaves other vendors not able to make the switch to OAuth.

You might ask, why are you not using the Graph API?

Not all the functionalities on the EWS API are supported by Graph at this time. Performing a full calendar sync with the Graph API is very painful and requires to use the Beta endpoint, which according to your documentation is subject to change. Additionally the Graph api does not allow us to access Exchange on Premise.

All this to provide a piece of feedback from the vendor point of view: we would switch all accounts to OAuth tomorrow if this was working with EWS.

Hi all,

The Outlook Team has updated the guidance about this issue, Outlook and other apps are unable to connect to Outlook.com when using Basic authentication - Microsoft Support.

A key take away is that everyone needs to work towards being on apps that support OAuth for Outlook.com. If you are using Outlook 2013 and Outlook 2016 an immediately available free option is to install the New Outlook, Outlook for Windows - Microsoft Apps. We will continue to update the guidance with learnings and status updates as we go.

Well, I guess we are screwed, its seems that also Google is moving to OAuth starting September this year, is not really clear if they will continue to support "app passwords" or you will also have to switch to a client that supports OAuth as well.

So having to bite the bullet, how's the free "New Outlook" is that bad?

Same problem for me, unfortunately.

I totally agree with rest of the customers: I also paid for the Outlook Desktop application and it is extremely disappointing from Microsoft to have activated this mandatory OAuth implementation in Outlook without informing us previously. If we would have been informed with enough time, at least we would have been able to take some corrective actions time in advance.

This unannounced change feels like a slap in the face and for sure this isn't just a minor annoyance, it's indeed a major disruption to our daily life and a complete disregard for us, the Microsoft's paying customers.

And as other customers are telling, Microsoft should at least offer some compensation for the inconvenience and disruption that such change is causing us in the last weeks.