Troubleshoot Outlook Cannot Send Email with 5 Simple Ways

Scenario: Outlook not sending emails but receiving

Microsoft Outlook is a powerful email client that is used by millions of people around the world to manage emails, contacts, calendars, tasks, and more. Outlook is a great way to stay organized and connected with your contacts. However, sometimes Outlook can have issues sending emails. This can be a frustrating problem, but not unsolvable.

If you have no clue what to do, you can learn about what to do anytime you get the Outlook cannot send message error. Just read carefully about the following contents.

Why Outlook not sending emails stuck in outbox

First of all, you need to figure out what are the common reasons for Outlook email cannot send issue.

• Large size attachments
• MS outlook account password was changed recently
• The account was not authenticated with the mail server
• Outlook server or mail server remains offline
• …

Moving on, let's check the solutions immediately.

5 solutions to fix Outlook cannot send email

In this part, I’ve listed some simple methods to troubleshoot this error with just a few steps. You can try them to get yourself out of the dilemma.

• #1. Resend the message in the outbox
• #2. Check your Outlook online status
• #3. Sync Your Password if recently changed
• #4. Check if your Outlook inbox is full
• #5. Repair or reinstall Outlook in Windows 10

#1. Resend the message in the outbox

Firstly, when you encounter Outlook not sending emails stuck in outbox and have no clue to solve it, you can just resend the message again.

1. Right-click the email stuck in the outbox, point to Move and choose the Drafts folder.

2. Open the email in the Drafts folder and click Send.

3. Check to see if the message is now in the Sent folder or still in the outbox.

#2. Check your Outlook online status

Outlook will not send emails if you are not connected to the internet. Verify you are connected to the internet then ensure you're working online in Outlook.

1. Look at the lower-right corner of the Outlook window. If it says “Disconnected, Working Offline, or Trying to connect”, you are not connected to your email server.

2. Click the Send/Receive tab on the ribbon.

3. Click Work Offline in the Preferences group. You should now see Connected to Server in the lower-right corner of the window.

4. Click the Send/Receive All Folders button in the Send & Receive group.

5. Check to see if the message is now in the Sent folder or still in the outbox.

#3. Sync Your Password if recently changed

If you have recently changed your email password online, you must change it in Outlook as well or you won't be able to send (or receive) emails.

1. Click File > Account Settings > Account Settings.

2. Select the Email tab, choose your email account and click Change.

3. Enter your updated password in the Password box. Select Next > Close > Finish.

4. Select the Send/Receive All Folders button in the upper-left corner of the Outlook window or press F9 to try sending your email.

#4. Check if your Outlook inbox is full

Needless to say, if your inbox is full and does not have enough free space, then Outlook would not receive emails. To fix this, you can just go to the Junk, Inbox, or any other folder and delete all the unwanted emails. Or you can solve Outlook mailbox full using Mailbox Cleanup tool.

#5. Repair or reinstall Outlook in Windows 10

If none of these steps have solved the problem, you may need to repair or reinstall Outlook. It's possible your Outlook application is damaged. Use the built-in Microsoft Office repair utility to fix it.

1. Close all Microsoft Office applications. Type Apps & Features into the Windows search box.

2. Find and click on Microsoft Office in the list of installed apps and features.

3. Select Modify > Yes if a user account control Window appears asking, "Do you want to allow this app to make changes to your device?”

4. Select Online Repair > Repair. You can choose Quick Repair as well.

5. Restart Outlook when the repair process is complete. If this does not work, you may need to uninstall and reinstall Outlook.

Always backup Outlook emails to keep them safe

After solving the problem of outlook not sending emails stuck in outbox, you need to understand that emails are vital for both individuals and businesses, and if something unexpected happens it will have serious consequences. Therefore, you need to backup your Outlook emails regularly and even if there is any problem, you can use this email backup to restore it.

AOMEI Backupper Professional is a popular email backup software that offers many powerful features to protect your Outlook data safely in all aspects.

☪ It provides you Outlook Backup feature to backup any items inside Outlook including emails, attachments, calendar, contacts, etc.
☪ It has the ability to automatically run Outlook email backup to external hard drives, USB drives, network or NAS devices, cloud drives, etc. at daily, weekly, monthly, etc. intervals.
☪ It provides you 3 backup methods as full, incremental, and differential backup to help you save backup time and disk space thus improving backup efficiency.
☪ It is compatible with all Windows PC operating systems including Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7/XP/Vista.

Download and install this reliable backup software, and then start backing up Outlook emails by following the graphic tutorial.

Step 1. Open Outlook and log in with the account that contains the emails you want to backup.

Step 2. Launch AOMEI Backupper Professional and click Backup and Outlook Backup.

Step 3. Click Add Outlook data and select the account containing email messages you want to backup. Then click OK.

Step 4. Click the second box to select a local path, network or NAS location, or cloud drive to save your Outlook emails.

Step 5. Enable “Daily”, “Weekly”, “Monthly” or “Event triggers ” intervals to automate the backup tasks and click Start Backup to finish this process.

✌ Notes:
➣ By default, this software uses incremental backup method to backup changed data only. You can also change it to Differential Backup based on your needs.
➣ To decrease backup time and space, you are able to enable the automatic old backup cleanup method in the Backup Scheme.

Bottom line

Now you know how to fix Outlook cannot send email after read the whole passage carefully. Note that some failures will inevitably occur when using Outlook to manage emails, which will seriously lead to data loss. Therefore, it is crucial to create a backup for your emails using the best email backup software AOMEI Backupper. It safeguards your data by offering plenty of outstanding features in all aspects. Try it now if you want to learn more about it.