In the OUTLOOK online the mailbox name is not matching with mail address.

Question

In the OUTLOOK online the mailbox name is not matching with mail address.

Ivan Titarchuk 20

Hello!

Ive decided to check my Outlook account and found that mailbox name looks like "outlok_numbers/******@outlook.com", but if I sent an email to someone it is coming with the correct email address.

Desktop app start have an issue to connect this account too.

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Answer accepted by question author

EmilyS726 258.5K Independent Advisor

Hello

If you go to your account https://account.live.com > Your info > Sign in preference, is your primary alias an outlook.com or hotmail.com alias?

This can happen if your account originally started with a non-Microsoft domain alias, meaning, it was originally set up with a third party email address, such as gmail, yahoo, etc. Because they are third party email, their actual email service is still with their providers like Gmail or Yahoo, and when it comes to outlook.com, they only served as username, but it doesn't have actual email functionality. And since outlook.com is the web mailbox for Microsoft account, so Microsoft would come up with a placeholder outlook.com address to label your mail box.

Even if you later added an outlook.com or hotmail.com alias, this mailbox name will stay. But your outbound email should carry the actual outlook.com or hotmail address. Unfortunately I don't think you can change that. I have the same problem too as I initially set up mine with gmail.com address. Years later, even though I have added an outlook.com alias, my mailbox still shows the random outlook.com address.

Regarding the desktop app issue, can you tell me more about it?

Ivan Titarchuk 20 Reputation points

2026-04-30T02:52:52.76+00:00

Hello,

Thank you for your reply.

As Q&A Assist recommended, I set my Outlook email as the default in my Microsoft account. However, the email name didn’t change in the online version right away. Today I noticed that it finally updated to the normal one.

The issue with the desktop version was that I kept getting an error every time I tried to add the Outlook account. But since the Outlook name has now changed back, I was able to add it without any problems.

1 additional answer

Your answer

Ivan Titarchuk 20 Reputation points

2026-04-30T02:52:52.76+00:00

Hello,

Thank you for your reply.

As Q&A Assist recommended, I set my Outlook email as the default in my Microsoft account. However, the email name didn’t change in the online version right away. Today I noticed that it finally updated to the normal one.

The issue with the desktop version was that I kept getting an error every time I tried to add the Outlook account. But since the Outlook name has now changed back, I was able to add it without any problems.

Answer 1

This behavior matches a known Outlook.com issue where the account shows as outlook_[long series of letters and numbers]@outlook.com in Outlook, even though messages are sent with the correct address.

There are two supported workarounds, depending on how the account is used.

If this is a third‑party address registered as a Microsoft account (or Outlook.com with a non‑Outlook alias as primary) Use a manual IMAP/POP setup in the desktop Outlook client so it connects directly to the real mailbox instead of the hidden Outlook.com address:
Close Outlook.
Press Windows key + R, type outlook /profiles and select OK (note the space before /).
In Choose Profile, select Options > New.
Enter a new profile name and select OK.
Choose Advanced options > Let me set up my account manually.
Enter the email address and password, then select Connect.
If setup fails, select Change Account Settings and enter the IMAP/POP server details from the provider or from the POP/IMAP reference linked in the article, then select Connect and Done.
Back in Choose Profile, select Set as default profile and OK.

This makes the desktop app use the correct mailbox and avoids the outlook_[numbers] address.

If this is an Outlook.com account with multiple aliases Switch the primary alias to an Outlook.com/Hotmail.com address so Outlook uses that instead of the internal outlook_[numbers] value:
Go to https://account.live.com/names/Manage and sign in.
Set the Outlook.com or Hotmail.com address as the primary alias.
In Outlook for Windows, remove the account and then add it again following the steps in Add your Outlook.com account in Outlook for Windows (linked in the article).

After this, the mailbox name in Outlook should align with the visible Outlook.com address, and the desktop app should connect normally.

If the problem persists, use the Outlook.com in‑product Help option or the support links in the article’s Still need help? section for direct assistance.

References:

Fixes or workarounds for recent issues on Outlook.com