


In that case, you use the workaround described below this method. Unfortunately, this method is quite buggy and you rarely get the “Open Outlook Properties” command via the following method. You can also change the default message format on a per user or even a per e-mail address basis. Solution 4 – Change on a per contact basis Simply create a new message or use the Reply or Forward button and then follow the instructions below.įormat Text-> click on the ellipsis (…) button on the right-> Message FormatĬlick on the Pop Out button above the message to open the email in its own window and then use one of the two methods mentioned above to change the message format. Regardless of your default preference, you can choose to change the message format to any other mail format when you have the need for it. Solution 3 – Change on a per message basis In those cases it is also not possible to send out a Rich Text message to an external recipient even though the mail client of the external recipient supports it. In that case, the conversion will take place at Exchange (server) level instead of at Outlook (client) level. Setting this option might not be needed for most Exchange environments as the Exchange server also holds this option and has it enabled by default. File-> Options-> Mail-> option group: Message Format-> option: When sending messages in Rich Text format to Internet recipients.If you prefer to use the Rich Text format for messages that you sent internally but want to send out in the HTML or Plain Text format for external contacts, you can set the following option: Solution 2 – Use Rich Text internally but not externally For this, see solution 3 below.Ĭhanging the default message format in Outlook. You can still easily change back to Rich Text on a per message basis if you have a need for it. File-> Options-> section Mail-> option: Compose messages in this format.If you want to get rid of the Rich Text format default, you can change this in the following way Solution 1 – Changing the default message format In other words Only use Rich Text when you have an absolute need for it and know that the recipients mail client supports it. The following shows the message format order from best to least compatible with other mail clients: To prevent sending out Winmail.dat files, make sure you don’t send out Rich Text formatted messages to people who use a mail client other than Outlook as Outlook is basically the only mail clients which supports that format. Prevent sending out a Winmail.dat attachment Therefor, it is important to prevent Outlook from sending out your emails with Winmail.dat attachments. In most cases, simply renaming the Winmail.dat attachment to the actual attachment name will allow you to recover the attachment. When a receiver, whose client doesn’t support Rich Text format, gets a message that has a Winmail.dat attachment, it could be the case that any other attachment that got sent with the message will be within the Winmail.dat file as well and therefore inaccessible for the receiver. Winmail.dat and missing other attachments Solution 4 – Change on a per contact basis.Solution 3 – Change on a per message basis.Solution 2 – Use Rich Text internally but not externally.Solution 1 – Changing the default message format.Prevent sending out a Winmail.dat attachment.Winmail.dat and missing other attachments.When you send a message to someone whose mail client doesn’t support Rich Text format (basically any other mail client which is not developed by Microsoft) or when it is improperly converted on the mail server, they will receive the message with the Winmail.dat file as an attachment. The Winmail.dat file holds information for the Rich Text message format.
