How to Recall an Email in Outlook (New, Classic and Web, 2026)

To recall an email in Outlook, open the sent message from your Sent Items folder in its own window, then choose Recall Message (new Outlook and Outlook on the web) or Actions > Recall This Message (classic Outlook for Windows) and confirm. Recall only works if you and the recipient both have Microsoft 365 or Exchange work or school accounts in the same organization, so it can’t pull back mail you sent to Gmail or a personal Outlook.com address.

Below are the exact steps for each version of Outlook, what the recall report tells you, and what to do when recall isn’t an option. Menu names and admin defaults are accurate as of October 2026, but Microsoft changes Outlook frequently, so labels may shift.

Before you start: will recall work for you?

Recall isn’t a universal “unsend” button. According to Microsoft’s support article, it’s available only after you select Send, and only when:

• You and the recipient both use a Microsoft 365 or Microsoft Exchange email account.
• You’re both in the same organization.
• The recipient isn’t on Gmail, Hotmail, live.com or another outside service.

If you sent the message to someone outside your company, recall won’t help. Skip ahead to the “If recall isn’t available” section.

Which Outlook versions support recall

Sources don’t fully agree here. Microsoft’s support article says recall isn’t available in Outlook for Mac, while a few third-party guides describe a Mac recall button. Older guides also claim recall doesn’t work in Outlook on the web, which no longer matches Microsoft’s current documentation. When in doubt, trust what your own ribbon shows.

How to recall an email in new Outlook for Windows

1. Select Sent Items in the left folder pane.
2. Double-click the message so it opens in a separate window. The recall command doesn’t appear when the message is only in the reading pane.
3. On the ribbon, select Recall Message. If you use the Simplified ribbon and don’t see it, select More options (the three dots) first.
4. Select OK in the confirmation dialog.

Microsoft notes that if these steps don’t match your screen, you may still be on classic Outlook, so try the classic steps below.

How to recall an email in classic Outlook for Windows

1. Go to Sent Items.
2. Double-click the message to open it in its own window.
3. On the Message tab, select Actions > Recall This Message.
4. Choose one of the two options:
   • Delete unread copies of this message to simply pull it back.
   • Delete unread copies and replace with a new message to send a corrected version.
5. Select OK. If you chose to replace it, edit the message that opens and select Send.

If your organization uses Exchange Online with cloud-based recall turned on (more on that below), classic Outlook uses the same server-side recall as the other clients. If an admin has turned cloud-based recall off, classic Outlook falls back to the older client-side recall, according to Microsoft Learn as summarized by Practical365.

How to recall an email in Outlook on the web

1. Sign in to Outlook on the web with your work or school account.
2. Open Sent Items and double-click the message to open it in a separate window.
3. Select Recall Message on the ribbon (or under More options on the Simplified ribbon).
4. Select OK to confirm.

The “replace with a new message” option is documented for classic Outlook. If you don’t see it in new Outlook or on the web, the practical workaround is to recall the original and then send a fresh, corrected email.

Checking whether the recall worked

You won’t get an instant yes or no on screen. Instead, Microsoft says a Message Recall Report lands in your inbox, usually in under 30 seconds, titled along the lines of “Message Recall Report for message [subject].”

1. Open the report email.
2. Select View Message Recall Report. It opens in your browser, and you may be asked to sign in with your mailbox credentials.
3. Check the status for each recipient: succeeded, pending or failed.

If the recall can’t run right away, Microsoft says it keeps retrying for up to 24 hours. A “pending” status for a while isn’t necessarily a failure.

What changed with cloud-based recall

Older Outlook recall ran on the recipient’s side and failed often, for example when the recipient had already opened the message or used a different client. Microsoft moved Exchange Online to cloud-based message recall, which runs on the server and works the same way regardless of which Outlook app you or the recipient use, as covered by Petri and Microsoft Learn.

Admins get several controls, which explains why recall behaves differently at different companies:

• Recalling read messages. Admins can allow or block recall of messages the recipient has already read, from the Exchange admin center (Settings > Mail flow, “Allow users to recall messages read by the recipient”) or with Set-OrganizationConfig -RecallReadMessagesEnabled. The default is null, which acts as allowed.
• Recipient alerts. Admins can notify recipients when a message is recalled, either for every recall or only for read messages. This is off by default.
• Maximum message age. There’s a limit on how old a message can be and still be recalled. The default is reported as 365 days, and admins can change it.
• Turning it off. Admins can disable cloud-based recall entirely, which returns Outlook for Windows users to the classic client-side version.

This is also why sources disagree about read messages. Microsoft’s consumer-facing help still says the recipient must not have opened the message, while the admin documentation describes recalling read messages as the default. Your result depends on how your tenant is configured, so if a recall of a read message fails, ask your IT team.

If recall isn’t available: use Undo Send next time

Recall can’t help with external recipients, personal accounts or Outlook for Mac. The closest official alternative is Undo Send, which holds each message for a few seconds after you click Send so you can cancel it. It doesn’t pull back anything that has already left your outbox, so it only helps if you turn it on before you make the mistake.

The Mac details come from Microsoft’s Undo Send article, which notes the feature is available for Microsoft 365 and Outlook.com accounts. The Windows and web paths come from Bowdoin College’s IT guide and third-party guides, so exact labels and limits may differ slightly in your version.

Tips to improve your odds

• Act quickly. The sooner you recall, the less likely the message has been forwarded or acted on.
• Check the report instead of assuming it worked.
• Follow up directly if anything failed. A short “please disregard my last email” is often more reliable than a recall.
• Don’t count on secrecy. Depending on admin settings, recipients may be told a message was recalled.
• Turn on Undo Send in every Outlook app you use. It’s the only protection that also covers external recipients.