Autodiscovery Outlook 2019/2021/365 with own (non Exchange) email server

Question

Autodiscovery Outlook 2019/2021/365 with own (non Exchange) email server

m7913d 16

What is the correct approach to support autodiscovery of IMAP (and optionally ActiveSync) settings by recent Outlook versions, requiring no extra configuration changes on the client pc (such as disabling Simplified Profile Creation, altering the registry, ...) supporting any IMAP (and optionally ActiveSync) compatible mail server.

Other similar question are already asked, but the suggested solutions do not work or they suggest some work around that are inconvenient in general (f.ex. in case of personal computers not managed by an organisation):

Setting SRV records (see https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/daa5fd1f-883e-4ca9-8ebc-3b25576ced28/autodiscover-for-imap-account-on-outlook-20162019?forum=outlook)
Providing a https://<domain>/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml configuration file (Why is this not support by the simplified profile creation?)

Faery Fu-MSFT 19,751 Reputation points Moderator

2022-07-25T01:18:27.147+00:00

Hi @m7913d ,

It is recommended you mark the helpful reply as answer, this will make answer searching in the forum easier and be beneficial to other community members as well. Thanks for your understanding.
m7913d 16 Reputation points

2022-07-25T22:24:56.037+00:00

Hi @Faery Fu-MSFT ,

I would like to mark a helpful reply as answer. However, none of the answers solve my question, i.e. convenient autodiscovery without configuration changes on the client supporting any compliant IMAP server.

Provided answers do not work, or require configuration changes on the client pc/special actions by the end user, which (partially) destroys the advantage of autodiscovery.

The third answer only suggest to contact Microsoft by other means, which isn't a real answer to the question. So , hopefully, someone else will post a better answer.

3 answers

Your answer

Faery Fu-MSFT 19,751 Reputation points Moderator

2022-07-25T01:18:27.147+00:00

Hi @m7913d ,

It is recommended you mark the helpful reply as answer, this will make answer searching in the forum easier and be beneficial to other community members as well. Thanks for your understanding.
m7913d 16 Reputation points

2022-07-25T22:24:56.037+00:00

Hi @Faery Fu-MSFT ,

I would like to mark a helpful reply as answer. However, none of the answers solve my question, i.e. convenient autodiscovery without configuration changes on the client supporting any compliant IMAP server.

Provided answers do not work, or require configuration changes on the client pc/special actions by the end user, which (partially) destroys the advantage of autodiscovery.

The third answer only suggest to contact Microsoft by other means, which isn't a real answer to the question. So , hopefully, someone else will post a better answer.

Answer 1

Hey @m7913d

Have you tried setting up a SRV record with your mail server?

Exchange 2013, 2016 – Autodiscover SRV record by Mark Gossa

https://markgossa.com/2015/11/exchange-2013-2016-autodiscover-srv-record.html

Is there a way to use the Autodiscover feature without Exchange? (See answer by Aaron C. de Bruyn)

First you will need to tell Outlook where to go. Use an SRV record in DNS that points to the server containing your Autodiscover.xml file:

_autodiscover._tcp.mydomain.com. 3600 IN SRV 10 10 443 my-web-server.mydomain.com.

Use the PHP script here: http://virer.net/info/ol-autodiscover/index.html to return the Autodiscover.xml file to clients. It has some PHP embedded so you can return different values depending on the e-mail address entered into Outlook. (Helpful if you want to use one autodiscover file to return results for multiple domains/clients using one config script).

Once that script is on your webserver and working, make sure you enable HTTPS with a valid certificate so Outlook doesn't throw errors when trying to download it.

https://serverfault.com/questions/244660/is-there-a-way-to-use-the-autodiscover-feature-without-exchange

-------------------------------------

If this is helpful please mark as correct answer.

m7913d 16 Reputation points

2022-07-24T19:28:37.957+00:00

Thanks for your answer. However the provided solutions do not seem to work with recent outlook versions, i.e. using the Simplified Profile Creation tool.

As stated in my question, I tried to setup SRV records, but this does not seem to work with the Simplified Profile Creation tool (as used by default by recent Outlook versions). I do not seem to be the only person encountering this issue (see f.ex. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/60298006/what-major-e-mail-clients-actually-make-use-of-dns-srv-autoconfiguration#comment129022838_60298006)

The two links you provided are rather old. I suspect they are invalid now (or require at least the end user to access the old mail account setup wizard accessible from the control panel now). Are you able to use these approaches with Outlook 2019/2021 and 365?

Note that I'm able to implement autodiscovery when this old wizard is used to setup the mail account. However, this is inconvenient for normal end users.

Answer 2

Hi @m7913d

Here is another couple of solutions I have found (workarounds)

Autodiscover not working properly on Outlook

https://talk.plesk.com/threads/autodiscover-not-working-properly-on-outlook.356682/page-2

Microsoft Support suggested for us reactive solution only: when mail autodiscover failed for a customer, you can

bypass using an MS proxy server by adding a registry key to the Outlook client (using Registry on a local machine):

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\x.0\Outlook\AutoDiscover
Name : ExcludeExplicitO365Endpoint

Value : 1

Anthony from Plesk

Second option:

Check out TomBoB's response (autodiscover_587.sh and autodiscover.xml) further down the thread on https://talk.plesk.com/threads/autodiscover-not-working-properly-on-outlook.356682/page-2

If this is helpful please don't forget to mark as correct answer.

m7913d 16 Reputation points

2022-07-24T20:08:07.553+00:00

Thanks for those workarounds. However, I would like a solution requiring no special actions by the end user/on the pc of the end user. A proper solution should solely consist of correctly setting up everything on the server side.

Answer 3

Dillon Silzer 57,831 Volunteer Moderator

Some recommendations for you since you cannot make adjustments to client side configurations:

1) You can purchase support for your business at:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/support-for-business-1f4c4d09-9047-28ac-bb3b-618757e3bffd

Microsoft Professional Support (pay-per-incident)

2) You can submit feedback for Outlook 2019+ on https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/forum/89a8afa3-2e1c-ec11-b6e7-0022481f8472

If you found this answer helpful please feel free to mark as correct answer.

m7913d 16 Reputation points

2022-07-24T20:38:06.947+00:00

As suggested, I submit some feedback for Outlook 2019+; https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/be465ede-8f0b-ed11-a81b-6045bd7d68ae

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Autodiscovery Outlook 2019/2021/365 with own (non Exchange) email server

3 answers

bypass using an MS proxy server by adding a registry key to the Outlook client (using Registry on a local machine):

Value : 1

Your answer