Outlook.com Tasks no longer allow setting a time‑of‑day — Extremely user UNfriendly

Question

Outlook.com Tasks used to allow choosing a specific time‑of‑day for reminders. The current design removed that control entirely and assigns arbitrary default times that cannot be changed. In many cases, the reminder UI fails to load and the entire Tasks pane collapses into Calendar mode, making the controls unreachable. This is an aggravating, user-UNfriendly usability regression and breaks basic task‑management workflows. Please restore explicit time‑of‑day controls and fix the UI collapse issue.

Answer 1

@Jerry Swingle said

Tasks used to allow choosing a specific time‑of‑day for reminders. The current design removed that control entirely and assigns arbitrary default times that cannot be changed

Not sure I understand. How are you creating your Task?

When I create a new Task from To Do, I am able to set a specific Reminder Date/Time.

Answer 2

Outlook tasks and Microsoft To Do still support reminders with dates, but the provided information only documents:

• Creating and managing tasks and reminders in the integrated To Do experience in new Outlook (including due dates and reminders).
• Using My Day and smart lists such as Planned, Due Today, and Important to organize and focus on tasks.

The context does not describe any option to configure a specific time‑of‑day for task reminders in Outlook.com / new Outlook, nor any setting to change the default reminder time. It also does not document or provide a workaround for the Tasks pane collapsing into Calendar mode.

From the available documentation, the supported, documented options are:

1. Use To Do inside new Outlook to manage tasks
   • Open To Do in new Outlook to view all task lists and smart lists such as My Day, Planned, All, Completed, Assigned to me, Flagged Email, and Due Today.
   • For each task, it is possible to set a due date and a reminder, mark it as important, add steps, notes, and files, and make it recurring.
2. Use My Day to focus on daily work
   • Add tasks to My Day directly, or from other lists via Add to My Day in the task details.
   • My Day resets every night; incomplete tasks remain in the main Tasks list and may appear in suggestions the next day.
3. Organize tasks using views and filters
   • Use different task views (Board, Grid) and tools such as filters and sorting to focus on what matters most.

Because the context does not document time‑of‑day reminder controls or the collapse issue, it only supports using the current To Do and My Day features as designed. For product changes (restoring explicit time‑of‑day controls, fixing the Tasks pane behavior), the appropriate path is to submit feedback directly through the Outlook / To Do feedback channels in the client so it reaches the product team.

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References:

• Manage tasks with To Do in Outlook
• My Day and suggestions
• Manage your tasks with My Tasks and My Day