Outlook.com not syncing or receiving emails

The quick answer

Sending works but nothing comes in — why

When email goes out but nothing comes in, that pattern is a strong clue in itself. Sending uses one connection to the server; receiving uses another, plus the rules and folders that decide where each message lands. So a “sending fine, not receiving” fault is almost never a broken account — it is usually one of these:

• Your password changed (perhaps for security) and the desktop app is still trying the old one, so it can send from cache but cannot pull new mail.
• Outlook is stuck in Work Offline, quietly holding everything back.
• The mail is arriving — but a rule, the Junk folder, the Blocked Senders list, or the Focused/Other split is hiding it from your main view.
• Your storage is full: Outlook.com stops receiving, and sending, once the mailbox or the cloud storage that OneDrive files and email attachments share is full (what to do when OneDrive is full).

Work through the steps below and you will land on the culprit quickly. We have split them into the desktop app and the browser, because the fix differs.

In the browser and beyond

Fix Outlook.com in a browser (and the hidden-mail checks)

If you read Outlook.com at outlook.com in a web browser, or the app checks above didn't help, do these:

1. Hard-refresh the page. Press Ctrl + F5 to force a fresh load past a stale cache. If it is still odd, clear your browser cache, or open Outlook.com in a private/incognito window to rule the browser out.
2. Check your Rules. In Outlook.com go to Settings then Mail then Rules. A rule that moves or deletes incoming mail — set up long ago and forgotten — is a classic cause of “nothing arrives.” Disable anything suspicious.
3. Check Blocked senders and Junk. Go to Settings then Mail then Junk email and review Blocked senders and domains, then look inside the Junk Email folder itself. Move any wanted sender back and mark them safe.
4. Check your storage quota. Outlook.com stops receiving once the mailbox, or the cloud storage that OneDrive files and email attachments share, is full. In Settings then General then Storage, see how full you are; empty large items and the Deleted Items folder if you are near the limit.

If mail is still not arriving after all of that, the fault may be at the server or account-security level — the point at which a quick remote session saves you a lot of guesswork. We are Windows and Android specialists (Outlook on Windows and the Outlook Android app — not Apple), a Microsoft Partner rated 4.9 on Google, fixing Dorset email since 1995.