Take Advantage of Outlook's "Message Recall" Feature

Everyone has experienced a moment when they wish you can un-send a message with a typo, wrong or left out information, or an accidently sent draft.

Microsoft Outlook has a feature called “Message Recall” that is built-in for such mistakes, but not many users are aware of it. If you’ve sent something in error, you can go to your Sent Items folder in the left-hand navigation pane. Open the message you wish to recall, then go to the Action drop menu and select Recall this Message.



You will then be given an option to delete the sent message or replace it with a new message.



The Windows version of Outlook is the only one that contains this feature. Unfortunately, Mac users are out of luck.

However, the Message Recall feature has some limitations.

First, both the sender and the recipient of the message must be using Microsoft Exchange as an email server. It won’t work with Gmail, Yahoo, or any POP3-based email.

Second, the message cannot be recalled is the recipient has already read the message.

Third (and this is very important to keep in mind), the recipient still has the option to read the original message. You can’t magically erase that nasty email you sent to your superior in a fit of frustration because you’re having second thoughts. Your boss’s inbox will contain a message from the Exchange server telling them that a message sent from you has been recalled. Your boss might ignore it, but s/he may read it if s/he so chooses.

Another tip: to avoid accidentally sending an email prematurely, leave the “To:” field blank until you’ve finished writing the message.