How to create and use an email template in Outlook

Which Outlook are you on?#

If the menus in this guide do not match your screen, you are on a different Outlook than the last article you read assumed. Microsoft ships four products under one name, and each saves a reusable message in its own way.

How do I create an email template in Outlook?#

This is the .oft route, and it is what people mean when they search for an Outlook email template. It stores the whole message: subject, body, formatting, images, signature.

1. Open Outlook and start a new email.
2. Write the message the way you want it to look every time. Subject, body, colours, logo, signature.
3. In the message window, choose File > Save As.
4. In the Save as type box, choose Outlook Template. That is the entry that writes a .oft file.
5. Give it a short name, because the name becomes the menu label, then press Save.
6. Close the message window. Do not send it, and do not keep it as a draft.

How do I use a template in Outlook?#

On classic Outlook for Windows: open a new message, then choose New Items > More Items > Choose Form. In the Look In dropdown pick User Templates in File System, then double-click your template. Some builds list the saved names directly under New Items, one click shorter.

On new Outlook for Windows and Outlook on the web the route is one menu: Home > New > Mail from template, then pick the name in the Templates dialog. In both products Microsoft repeats the same warning: the edits you make there do not change the template.

If the template is missing from that list it was probably saved as a draft, or from a different Outlook. Check the storage path below before rebuilding it.

What is an .oft file in Outlook?#

An .oft file is Outlook's own container for one saved message. Microsoft describes it as a saved email draft that carries the subject, the message content, the formatting and any attachments. That is the difference between an .oft and text you paste out of Word: the file keeps the fields of a message, not only the body.

Because it is one file, you can copy it into a backup, mail it to a colleague, or keep it somewhere safe before reinstalling Windows. New Outlook for Windows and Outlook on the web can now read the files classic Outlook wrote, which was not the case when most of the guides you will find were written.

That limit is the whole reason a designed email to a customer list is a different product from a template. The merge fields, the list itself and the report after the send sit outside what any .oft can hold.

Where are Outlook templates stored?#

To move a template, copy the .oft file into the same folder on the other PC and restart Outlook. There is no sync for these files. AppData is hidden in File Explorer by default, so tick Hidden items under the View tab if you cannot see it.

How do I move an Outlook template to another computer?#

Three routes, and which one works depends on the Outlook you are leaving and the one you are arriving at.

1. Classic to classic: open C:\Users\<you>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates in File Explorer, copy the .oft files, paste them into the same folder on the new PC, then restart Outlook. AppData stays hidden until you tick Hidden items on the View tab.
2. Classic to new Outlook: keep the .oft files somewhere safe, then add them from Settings, Mail > Templates, Add, Add OFT.
3. New Outlook or the web app to anywhere: open Settings, Mail > Templates, choose Save as OFT on the template, and you hold a file you can attach to an email to yourself.

There is no sync for classic templates and no account to sign into to get them back. If the old machine is already wiped and you never copied the file, the template is gone with it. That is the dead end in most of these searches, so keep the folder of .oft files somewhere you already back up.

To hand one to a colleague, Microsoft adds a fourth way that skips File Explorer entirely. Open the draft, then on the Message tab choose Forward as OFT. Outlook writes the draft as an .oft file and attaches it to a new message, so the other person receives the design, the subject and the formatting in one attachment.

What are Quick Parts, and when are they better?#

Quick Parts saves one block instead of a whole email. If you repeat a single paragraph, a booking policy or an intro or a sign-off, this is faster than a template and it keeps the formatting of that block.

1. Type and format the paragraph inside a new message.
2. Select it, then open the Insert tab and choose Quick Parts.
3. Pick Save Selection to Quick Part Gallery and name it.
4. In a later email, put the cursor where the block goes, open Insert > Quick Parts and click the name.

Quick Parts live in the NormalEmail.dotm file, for that Outlook profile on that machine. They do not travel with the mailbox, so a second PC and the web app will not show them.

Signatures are a template in disguise

A lot of small businesses keep their whole newsletter in the signature box so it appears without effort. It works until you want two different versions, because a signature is tied to one account and always lands at the bottom of the message.

Why does my template not have my latest changes?#

Because a template is not the message you are typing into. Microsoft states it inside the steps: changes made after opening a template are not saved to the template, and pressing Save creates a draft of that message without touching the template. Editing your way to a better version is not possible from the opened copy.

• The email you are writing and the template are two separate things. You can send, delete or leave the message in Drafts and the template never notices.
• To change the template you save a new one, which in classic Outlook means File > Save As with Outlook Template as the type again.
• In new Outlook, templates saved with Mail Templates belong to the account you were composing from, and Settings, Mail > Templates lists them by account.

The habit that ends this is naming. Give the new version a date in its name, open it once to check it came out right, then delete the older one from the Templates list. Two templates with the same name in a dropdown is how people keep sending the old wording.

Can I use an Outlook email template on Mac or on the web?#

Outlook for Mac has its own command: choose File > Save As Template, name it, pick a location, then start it later with File > New > Mail From Template. The file it writes ends .emltpl, and Outlook on Windows cannot open it. Microsoft states those built-in Mac controls are available to Microsoft 365 subscribers and to users on version 15.35 (170610) and later of Outlook for Mac. The My Templates add-in also works on Mac, for Microsoft Exchange accounts, and not in a shared mailbox.

New Outlook on Windows and Outlook on the web are a different story than they were. They carry two features with one word of difference in the name: Mail Templates, which Microsoft says saves a full email including recipients, subject, body, formatting, images and attachments, and the My Templates add-in, which saves short text snippets with plain text and basic styling. The one people mean when they complain about losing their design is the add-in.

Both sit behind a qualifying Microsoft 365 subscription in new Outlook. If your account does not have one, neither command appears, and the only thing left that keeps formatting is the classic .oft file on the Windows machine you are already using. That subscription condition is why the same set of menus is missing from one screen and present on the next.

1. Open a new email and find My Templates in the ribbon. On some builds you add it first from Apps or Get add-ins.
2. Pin the pane so it stays open while you write.
3. Type or paste your text into the message, then press + Template in the pane to save it.
4. Later, click the saved template to drop that text into the email.

Can new Outlook and Outlook on the web use an .oft file?#

Yes, in both, with one condition attached. Microsoft now documents adding .oft files from your device and downloading saved templates as .oft files in new Outlook for Windows and Outlook on the web. Both need an account on a qualifying Microsoft 365 subscription, so a plain Outlook.com free mailbox will not see the commands.

1. Open the Settings page and choose Mail > Templates. The templates saved to that account are listed there.
2. Choose Add, then Add OFT, and pick the files in the dialog. Several can go in at once.
3. Microsoft points that picker at the classic folder, c:\users\<you>\appdata\roaming\microsoft\templates, so templates saved years ago in classic Outlook are already where new Outlook looks.

The other direction works from the same list. Pick Save as OFT on a template and it lands in File Explorer as a file you can keep, version, or send to a colleague. This is the cleanest answer to a question that used to have no answer at all: a design built in new Outlook can now leave the app as a file.

What is the difference between Mail Templates and My Templates?#

New Outlook has two saved-message features with names one word apart, and they are not the same tool. Microsoft publishes the split, and most of the confusion online comes from people describing one and searching for the other.

Microsoft assigns each one a job: Mail Templates for complete repeatable emails such as newsletters and announcements, My Templates for reusable phrases such as standard replies. Both sit behind the qualifying subscription in new Outlook, and neither one of them merges a name into 400 messages.

That table settles most of the "my template has vanished" searches. What you saved lives in one of five places, and three of them are files or settings on the machine you were already sitting at.

Why does my designed email look wrong in Outlook?#

Classic Outlook on Windows renders mail with Microsoft Word, not with a browser engine. Word ignores most of the styling a web email tool writes. Padding shifts, CSS buttons lose their background, images go full width, and a font nobody installed is swapped for one Word likes.

The design looked correct while you edited it because the editor is a browser. That gap is why built-in fonts and table layouts are still the standard advice for email in 2026. Our own pick is in the best font for emails.

What no Outlook template can do#

Once you mail more than a handful of customers, the feature stops matching the job, so people move off Outlook.

• There is no merge field for names. One .oft file holds one body, so typing 400 emails by hand is an afternoon of work.
• Nothing tracks what happened after the send. Outlook has no open or click tracking and keeps no bounce list, so Sent Items proves only that you pressed send.
• It is not built to mail a list. A long To or Cc line shows every address to every stranger on it, so emailing many people safely is a different job from emailing one person.
• A classic template does not survive a change of machine. It is a file on one PC, so a reinstall, a new laptop or a colleague covering for you all start from an empty list unless you copied the .oft files across.

So which one should you use?#

• The same paragraph, to one person at a time: Quick Parts.
• The same designed email, again and again, on one Windows PC: an .oft template.
• A designed email to a list, each person seeing their own name, with a report afterwards: that needs a sending tool, because Outlook has no way to do it.

Common questions