Microsoft adds Google Calendar & Contacts support to Outlook 2016 for Mac

Microsoft on Wednesday launched preliminary support for Google Calendar and Contacts data in Office 2016 for the Mac, filling in a significant gap in the email and scheduling app. Along the same lines, Gmail accounts can now make better use of Outlook features.

The Calendar and Contacts support is initially rolling out through the Office Insider Fast program, which supplies potentially risky builds, Microsoft explained. Only Office 365 subscribers can sign up.

Insider support should grow "over the next several weeks," eventually reaching the broader Office 365 userbase later this year. There's no word on when the feature might reach standalone versions of Office.

The change will allow Google events and contacts to sync just like any other Outlook content, with all the same editing options. That also means sync with the Outlook iOS and Android apps.

Gmail users, meanwhile, can now take advantage of Outlook features like the Focused Inbox — which groups messages more likely to be important — and automatic detection of relevant travel and package details.

While Gmail was already supported in Outlook, more advanced features were previously reserved with people with an Exchange, Office 365, or Outlook.com address.

Earlier this month, Microsoft brought Touch Bar support to Office users with a 2016 MacBook Pro.

6 Comments

Metriacanthosaurus 8 Years · 880 comments

About 7 years ago

Good I guess, but wouldn't Outlook Mac users be using: A) Exchange contacts, and B) iCloud contacts? Seems like a niche. Guess thats why support took so long.

crowley 15 Years · 10431 comments

Crikey, Microsoft really leading the way with the state of the art here.

/s

seanismorris 8 Years · 1624 comments

Metriacanthosaurus said:

Good I guess, but wouldn't Outlook Mac users be using: A) Exchange contacts, and B) iCloud contacts? Seems like a niche. Guess thats why support took so long.

Not necessarily...

My sister workers with a loose collection of sales people. They are organized like a bunch of pyramids (though not a pyramid scheme) of direct marketers. They operate as a team. They get paid by Melaleuca. Basically, it's a referral system with residual income for salespeople.

Sharing contacts and calendars would be very useful, easy, and cheap with Google. I have (for an example) my own domain with email hosted by Google for free. I wanted to have the ability to keep an email account forever regardless of who hosts it. It Google suddenly forgets how to perform basic security (like Yahoo) I need to be able to move it elsewhere. Creating temp email accounts, email aliases, "sister" domains is also easy, etc.

1) Exchange is to expensive
2) iCloud (as far as I know) doesn't let you use your own domain

FYI: Having an email with iCloud.com, gmail.com, outlook.com, hotmail.com, Yahoo.com, MSN.com, etc. is amateurish and unprofessional.

The other advantage is I get almost no spam...

Looks like the starting price is $5/month (now) but gets you more.

https://gsuite.google.com/pricing.html

Notice video and voice conferencing is listed as included.

I have no idea if it's the same as what the article is discussing....

seanismorris said:

Metriacanthosaurus said:

Good I guess, but wouldn't Outlook Mac users be using: A) Exchange contacts, and B) iCloud contacts? Seems like a niche. Guess thats why support took so long.

I have (for an example) my own domain with email hosted by Google for free.

Say what now?