Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send – Find Out Why?

March 5, 2021April 16, 2022 admin 0 Comments Outlook Not Receiving Emails, Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send

“Microsoft Outlook not receiving emails but can send them.” It’s a prevalent issue that can take place during the use of this significant and efficient email client. In such a situation, users can send emails, but they don’t receive the messages in their mailbox. But, Using some hacks and simple DIYs, this tiring and tedious issue can be troubleshot. Let’s explore all the possible reasons and ways to fix this issue.

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The outlook is a great utility that opens a lot of opportunities when you are trying to increase the productivity of your organization. It offers a feature-rich environment to make mail communication and task scheduling easy among people. But, sometimes, users face some common issues that affect communication and increases the communication gap. One of the common problems faced by users is Outlook send receive error, where you can send an email but don’t receive one.

Why is Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send and How to Fix it?

This issue is possible due to some Outlook settings, changes, circumstances, and mailbox conditions. Even plug-ins used for ease of access can create hurdles like this issue. So, whether you are a Windows Outlook user, or Mac Outlook User, or even an Outlook.com user, it is a common hurdle in the path of your communication. Let’s explore some possible reasons for this situation and fixes for’em:

Common Reasons and fixes for Outlook.com, Outlook for Mac, and Outlook for Windows

1.Your Internet Connection

First things first, look for internet connectivity. As you need the internet to receive emails, you do need a proper internet connection, whether you are using Outlook.com, or Outlook for Windows and Mac to send/receive emails. Before checking the Internet connection, look for the LAN connection first because most of the time Local Network is the root of the problem. It could be a disconnected cable or misconfigured router connection.

2.Wrong Outlook Credentials

While trying to send/receive emails using Outlook, always make sure that your account settings and credentials are correct. To make sure that you’ve provided the right credentials and settings, go through the further steps:

Go to the Tools and navigate to the Accounts section.
Select Account from the left pane.
Now, verify that all the account credentials and details are correct.

If still the problem is not resolved, then look for the SSL settings or port that you are using.

3.Emails treated as Spam or any filtration

If you are unable to receive emails on Outlook.com then it is quite possible that your messages or emails are going to the spam folder or any filter is applied that is moving emails to some other location. You can also use the search bar to locate the emails from a particular email id or contact.

In the case of Outlook desktop clients or for Windows and Mac Outlook, If Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send, It is possible those emails are treated as suspicious or spam and filtered to the junk folder. You can check out these folders as well to find the received emails. In case to remove this filter you can disable the Junk email filter:

If, using Outlook Web:

Go to Settings > Mail.
Select Options and then Block or Allow.
Now, select the block or allow settings as per your preference.

If, using Outlook 2013, 2016, and 2019 on Mac or Windows:

Go to Home > Junk.
Select Junk email options.
Allow or disallow the email filter list.

4.Email Rules forwarding messages to sub-folders

It becomes quite easy to manage Outlook emails using the email rules. If any rule is forwarding your email or message to any sub-folder, then it’s obvious that it will not get reflected in your Inbox. So, try to remove that email rule.

Remove email rules in Outlook.com

Click on Settings and select View all Outlook settings.
Choose Mail and then click on the Rules.
Select the rule to delete and click on the Delete.

Remove email rules in Office 365, Outlook 2019, 2016, and 2013

Go to File and then select Manage Rules & Alerts
In the dialog box select the Rule that you want to remove and click on the Delete button.

5.Unavailable Email Server

It is possible that your Outlook mail server is offline. In such a case, try to reach out to your network administrator or mail provider to make sure that the server is online or offline.

Fix Email Receiving Issues on Outlook for Windows

1.Corrupt Outlook profile

A corrupt profile can also lead you to an “Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send” issue. So, try to create a new Outlook profile and add your email account to that:

Navigate to File and click on the Account settings.
From the drop-down, select Manage profiles and click on the Show Profiles.
Click on Show Profiles > Add
Provide a Profile Name and click Ok.
Then go through all the steps that Outlook prompts to add your email account to the new Outlook profile.
Restart the Outlook.

This will create a new Outlook profile with the same email account that will have no corruption in that.

2.Increased PST File Size

Large size PST files can cause performance degradation and email not receiving problems. Each version of Outlook has its limitation of PST size to work seamlessly. In Outlook 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and Office 365, the PST file could be grown up to 50 GB but beyond that limit, Outlook can show some problems. So, it’s better to keep it within the limits by using the split large pst file techniques.

3.Emails moving to “Other” Category

Outlook offers two categories to store emails. One is Focused and another one is Other. Focused stores the important emails while Others store the rest of them. It is possible that some of your receiving emails are getting stored in the Others tab. You can disable this smart sorting feature and the Focused inbox will no longer work.

Then, all your emails will get reflected in your Inbox.

To disable Focused Inbox on:

In Outlook.com or web, follow:

Go to Outlook web and log in using your credentials.
Click on the gear icon to open settings.
Now, click on the toggle to disable Focused Inbox.

In Windows Outlook Application:

Open Outlook desktop application and open View.
Then, click on Show Focused Inbox.

In Mac Outlook 2016:

If you are having an Office 365 Business account then you can disable the Focused Inbox:

Launch Outlook 2016 on Mac OS.
Open Organize tab and click on the Focused Inbox.

This will remove the focused and Others tab from the mailbox and all the emails will get listed in your inbox folder.

4.Outlook Plug-ins

To add more features and for making the tasks easy, Outlook offers a lot of plug-ins. You can install them easily and can implement them on your application. But, plug-ins also create custom commands and can create hassle in the Outlook performance. So, there are chances that plug-ins are the reason that Microsoft Outlook or Office 365 not receiving emails. Let’s disable these add-ins to eliminate this Send/Receive error:

Navigate to File > Options > Plugins
In the bottom section, click on the Go button for Manage.
Now, select the plug-ins or add-ins to disable and click on the remove button.
Click Ok and exit.

5.Cluttered Outlook Inbox

A cluttered or full inbox can be the most obvious reason that is making you unable to receive Outlook emails. Try out to remove unnecessary emails from your mailbox or you can simply block the unimportant mail addresses for getting unnecessary emails. You can also try to free up space using the following tips:

Delete unnecessary emails.
Archive Outlook emails from time to time.
Remove the empty folders and junk box emails.
Save attachments at another location rather than storing them in the mailbox.

Fix Mac Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send Issues

1.Exchange items saved as Cache

Synchronization of the Exchange server gets affected when the mail items are saved in the cache. Try to remove email items from the cache folder to fix the Outlook email receiving issue. But, before making your Outlook cache empty, try to backup your Outlook data.

To remove cache from the Mac Outlook application, follow the further steps:

Connect your computer to the Exchange server.
In the Navigation pane, Press the Control button and right-click on the Exchange folder, and select Properties.
Click on the Empty Cache button from the General tab.

This process will remove all the old items from the cache and will replace those items with the latest exchange items.

2.IMAP & POP authentication incomplete

Authentication of POP and IMAP accounts is required to use the outgoing mail SMTP server. If all your account settings are up to date and still the issue persists then you can turn on the SMTP authentication. For doing so, follow the below steps:

Navigate to Tools > Accounts
Choose Account from the left pane of the Accounts Wizard
Select More Options from the Outgoing Server option
From the pop-up, select the authentication type and provide the credentials
Your SMTP authentication will turn on.

3.Firewall blocking the connection to the server

Ask for an optional SMTP server for POP and IMAP accounts from the Network Admin or Internet Service Provider. It is also possible that if you are using your system on different locations, then the network firewall will have different restrictions so, in that case, a single SMTP server will not work in every place.

4.Outlook and Server linking issue

It is quite possible that your Mac Outlook is not linked with the Exchange server. In such a scenario, you will not receive Outlook messages.

To check the linking between Outlook and Exchange, follow the below steps:

In Outlook, navigate to Tools > Accounts > Exchange account in left-pane.
Look for the color of the indicator, if it’s orange then there is a linking issue.

If you want to check the linking then you can also try using Outlook web or directly check it by connecting to Exchange Server Administrator.

Final Words

If your Outlook Not Receiving Emails But Can Send, then this guide will definitely help you out to remove this blunder. Most of the time wrong credentials are the reason for the send/receive issue, so try to resolve that using the stated fix. I hope this article or your say how-to guide helps you out to remove the blunder.

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