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How do you completely eliminate/delete all categories that have previously been used and are no longer required.
I've decided to give up on this and continue using Classic Outlook until MS produce a New Outlook that is a fully functioning replacement.
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This has been broken since July 2024.
Microsoft have been made aware of it through literally thousands of comments on here, and on other forums.
They don't seem motivated to issue a fix, probably because it's not AI
Not a fix, sorry. But you can vote for and comment on this Feature Request
Add the ability in New Outlook to Delete a Contact/People Category.
https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/2af4e80b-beb9-f011-aa43-7c1e526e4a18
(You must "Sign In" at the top right of the Feedback page before you can vote).
At the moment, the only way to completely remove old categories is to switch to Classic Outlook, delete the categories there, and then return to the new Outlook. The new Outlook will sync the updated list.
Microsoft has said that full category management is still being added to the new Outlook, so this limitation is temporary.
I've tried that and managed to clear all categories. If I add a new category in New Outlook it always produces a e red coloured tag, irrespective of the colour I chose when I created the tag.
I get a Page Cannot Be Found error when I select See Answer
This is actually a known bug in New Outlook.
Here’s what’s happening:
When you create a new category in New Outlook for Windows, the UI lets you choose a color.
But the app currently ignores the selected color and assigns red by default.
Even if you delete all categories in Classic Outlook and return to New Outlook, the bug persists.
This is a limitation of the new Outlook’s still‑incomplete category system. Microsoft has acknowledged that category features including color assignment are still being rebuilt.
<content removed by moderator> See AI usage policy > Review before posting
Thanks for the information. After days of trying to sort things out, I've given up and will continue to use Classic Outlook until MS assures us that New Outlook is a proper fully functional replacement for it. I did discover, for what it's worth, that with 3 versions of Outlook (New, Classic, and Web) I could clear all the categories in Classic and New, but they still appeared in the Web version.
I think there's some confusion about what type of categories are broken.
Outlook (new version) has two types of categories:
There's the one that shows up in the Calendar. This is the one that allows you to create categories for calendar events (image below). This one works just fine.
For some reason, calendar categories also show up as an option to include against contacts in the address book in classic outlook.
These categories still work. You can edit, delete or add to them in either the new or classic outlook
The categories that are broken are these ones:
They used to be called Tags. They are specific to the people/address book part of outlook.
Microsoft renamed them to categories in the new outlook. They rolled out about 3 years ago.
These categories/tags only show up in the new outlook.
They do not show up in classic outlook (unless I'm missing something...if I am, please point it out to me).
These categories/tags cannot be delated once they are created, even if you remove all of these tags from the contact, they do not delete.
Microsoft were first made aware of this in July 2024.
To date, they have done nothing to fix it.
Once you create a category/tag in your outlook address book, it is there forever. No way to edit it or delete it.
I had 350 categories (I'm in recruitment). When the glitch occurred in 2024, the tags initially disappeared. I was advised to recreate them.
Then the old ones reappeared a few weeks later.
I now have over 700 categories stuck in my address book. Totally unusable.
Hey,
Quick question before I give you the steps because the menus are different for each version.
Are you trying to delete these categories in the classic Outlook desktop application, the New Outlook for Windows, or are you looking at the web version of Outlook?
The category says new outlook for windows
I'm using New Outlook and Classic Outlook side by side.
Thanks @Anthony Lee , there's many people who doesn't mark it correctly so I prefer to confirm manually.
As Peter said, the way is to use classic Outlook in the meantime.
As for the colour issue, to me sounds like the New Outlook app is glitching out on the color metadata or just has a bad cache, which happens a lot with that version.
Could you log into the web version of Outlook through your browser and try creating a category there to see if the color saves correctly?
If it works fine on the web, we know the issue is just the app on your computer and we can reset it. If it is stuck on red on the web too, then it is a deeper issue.
