Microsoft is building a new web-based Outlook application for Windows and Mac

Microsoft is building a new web-based Outlook application for Windows and Mac

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As part of Microsoft’s “One Outlook” initiative, the company is planning to launch a universal Outlook client based on the web application.

According Windows Central, the universal Outlook Web application (codenamed Monarch) will eventually replace the standard Mail and Calendar applications on Windows 10. The new application will also replace the various Microsoft Outlook applications currently available, including Outlook Web, Outlook (Win32) for Windows and Outlook for Mac.

Microsoft wants to replace existing desktop clients with an application developed with web technologies. The project will deliver Outlook as a single product, with the same user experience and code base, whether on Windows or Mac.

Notably, the next Outlook app will be accessible to everyone, whether they are free Outlook consumers or commercial customers, Windows Central said. Microsoft already detailed its vision for One Outlook in September last year, saying it wanted to offer consumers an experience that seemed native to the operating system, regardless of the platform of choice.

Microsoft is supposed to preview Monarch in late 2021, with the goal of replacing Mail & Calendar applications on Windows 10 in 2022. The company also plans to replace Outlook (Win32) with Windows. However, this will be a much more monumental task, considering how integrated the service is in the company.

When Monarch is released, it will offer OS integrations, such as offline storage, sharing targets, notifications and more. Windows Central claims that the Mail & Calendar apps for Windows 10 have been put into maintenance mode while Microsoft is in full swing with its universal Outlook client. The apps are supposed to receive a final UI adjustment as part of the Sun Valley update for Windows 10, but that’s about it.

A leaked version of the Microsoft Outlook web application was detected on Twitter by the user @WinObs. A description of the application says that One Outlook is only for “courageous dogfooders”, which is essentially a warning that things are in the early stages, even for internal testers. The Verge reports that the leaked application does not work without a full internal Microsoft account, so consumers may not be able to test it by the end of this year.

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