"Microsoft just did the impossible"...with its new mail service
Outlook..it has given a fresh and a tidy look which offers a great competition to the current king gmail...
I am not saying that it is a better alternative to gmail but surely it has a upper hand in some areas. Many users may find it more appealing and useful..you need to try it on your own for a few weeks to make up your mind.
Just to give a quick glimpse of the new Outlook I have connected my gmail to it and have been using it for a few days. Meanwhile I found some cool and unique features of this new mail service, that you will surely miss in gmail.
1.>Login with a temporary(one-time use) password
This
feature is something quite new and you may not find it in any other email service. Logging in with a temporary password is especially useful when you sign in using public computers. Once you add your mobile number to your outlook account, you can make use of this feature.
The Sign in page of outlook looks like this.
Click on the one-time-use password and you will be then asked for your mobile number. Enter it and you will receive a code on the registered mobile number. You can use this code to Sign In.
This code expires after first use and thus there is no risk. Gmail has an equivalent two step verification, but this one-time-use method is way more easy.
2.>Unlimited Storage Space
Gmail offers you a 10GB storage space, whereas Outlook offers a virtually unlimited storage space. The size of your inbox will keep on increasing as you keep receiving more and more emails, certainly a plus point as you need to pay for more storage space in Gmail
3.>Easily recover your deleted mails
What if you delete a mail, surely it goes to your trash folder and what if you empty your trash folder accidentally. Poof!..all the mails are gone. Outlook has a upper hand on this as it allows you to recover your deleted mails. I am not sure how long Microsoft is gonna keep the mails on their server, but certainly this feature can come in handy.
Just go to your trash folder and you will find the link to recover mails in case you have deleted them. Gmail has no such feature.
4.>Get disposable email addresses
This is one of the feature I certainly loved about Outlook mail. Creating disposable email addresses. You may certainly be visiting websites that require registration and ask for your email addresses. Once you sign up they will send you emails about their new campaigns, promotions, ads and what not.
To avoid this, you can simply create a disposable email address when you want to sign up somewhere. The advantage lies that you can delete these email addresses permanently when you don't need them.
Suppose the website starts sending you ads etc..simply remove the temporary email address and you are saved.. Cheers!!
However, its completely your choice to keep those email addresses in case you like the newsletters or something like that..
5.>Compose a message directly in HTML and CSS
Outlook offers a rich text editor as the gmail, but for power users it also offers a hidden surprise. You can switch to html editor and specify your own CSS styles to compose a mail. Like I said, it will certainly tickle the power users.
6.>Blocking email addresses
Gmail offers filters to block a particular sender from sending you emails. Outlook has made this process really simple by giving you the option of directly adding the blocked domains or users.
7.>Send large files with attachment
Like Gmail, Outlook also offers a maximum of 25MB to be attached with the mail, However, if the attachment size increases by 25MB, you need to upload the file to dropbox or some file sharing site and then send the link...tedious job isnt it..??
Outlook on the other hand automatically uploads the file to SkyDrive and sends it. This way you can easily attach large files to send. Gmail still lacks this functionality in-spite of having Google Drive that is similar to the Microsoft SkyDrive. Again a plus point.
8.>Sort By Size
Some people are really gonna like this functionality. Gmail misses it. You can actually sort your emails by size, that means you can know which emails are consuming a lot of space of your Inbox and it becomes easy to get rid of them.
Miscellaneous PLUS points:-
- Outlook is fast. Other than the beautiful UI of the new service, it is presumed to be relatively fast than any other mail service. Microsoft is calling it the preview version, but I couldn't find any bugs.
- If you are fed up of the ads gmail offers. Microsoft promises that it wont scan the keywords in your inbox to send you similar advertisements.
- Outlook is new. The point is that many new usernames are up for grabs. You can even get an id like yourname@outlook.com
So, don't miss the opportunity.
Well, this was the first impression...feel free to comment and add your own opinions...also stay tuned for more..and yes..
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