How to Configure and Customise Delivery and Read Receipts in Microsoft Outlook

When sending time-sensitive contracts, project deliverables, or executive announcements via email, knowing whether an email has safely reached the recipient’s mail server—and whether the recipient has actually opened it—is crucial. Microsoft Outlook provides two dedicated confirmation mechanisms: Delivery Receipts and Read Receipts. A delivery receipt confirms that your message successfully reached the recipient’s mailbox provider, while a read receipt alerts you when the recipient views the message. This tutorial details how to configure global receipt preferences, apply receipts to single outgoing messages, and manage incoming receipt prompts in Microsoft Outlook for desktop and web.

Understanding Delivery Receipts vs Read Receipts

Before implementing receipt tracking across your organization, it is important to distinguish the technical boundaries of both notification types:

• Delivery Receipt: Generated automatically by the recipient’s receiving mail server (Exchange, Postfix, or cloud gateway) as soon as the email is accepted and routed into their inbox. The recipient is never prompted, and they have no awareness that a delivery confirmation was dispatched. It serves as cryptographic proof that your email traversed the internet without bounce-backs.
• Read Receipt: Triggered on the client side when the recipient clicks open the email in their mail client (or marks it as read). Depending on the recipient’s software and privacy settings, their email client may prompt them to approve or decline sending the receipt. In external environments, many email servers block read receipts entirely for privacy compliance.

Configuring Receipts for a Single Outgoing Email

If you only require confirmation for specific high-priority messages, enable tracking flags directly within the message composition window:

1. Open Microsoft Outlook and click New Email (or press Ctrl + N).
2. In the composition ribbon, click the Options tab at the top.
3. Locate the Tracking group in the ribbon.
4. Check one or both tracking options:
   • Request a Delivery Receipt: Confirms the message arrived at the recipient’s mail server.
   • Request a Read Receipt: Confirms the recipient opened the message.
5. Compose your message and click Send.

Setting Global Receipt Preferences for All Outgoing Messages

For legal, compliance, or executive audit departments where all sent correspondence must be logged, you can automate receipt requests across every email:

1. Click the File tab in the upper-left corner of the main Outlook window.
2. Select Options from the left navigation panel.
3. In the Outlook Options dialogue box, click Mail.
4. Scroll down to the Tracking section.
5. Under For all messages sent, request:
   • Check Delivery receipt confirming the message was delivered to the recipient’s e-mail server.
   • Check Read receipt confirming the recipient viewed the message.
6. Click OK to apply the global configuration.

Tip: Enabling global read receipts is generally discouraged for routine communication, as recipients may find continuous receipt dialogues intrusive. Limiting tracking to delivery receipts provides server delivery confirmation without annoying external contacts.

Managing How Outlook Responds to Incoming Read Receipts

When external contacts send you an email containing a read receipt request, Outlook gives you complete control over how your client responds:

1. Navigate to File > Options > Mail > Tracking.
2. Under the heading For any message received that includes a read receipt request, choose one of three behavioral rules:
   • Always send a read receipt: Automatically dispatches confirmation back to the sender without prompting you.
   • Never send a read receipt: Silently drops all receipt requests, preserving your reading privacy.
   • Ask each time whether to send a read receipt (Default): Displays an interactive banner above the message body asking whether you wish to send a confirmation.
3. Click OK to save your preference.

Tracking and Reviewing Delivery Confirmations

When delivery and read receipts arrive in your inbox, Outlook automatically compiles their data into the original sent item:

1. Open your Sent Items folder.
2. Open the original sent message that had receipts requested.
3. In the Message tab on the ribbon, click the Tracking button in the Show group.
4. Outlook displays an organized table listing each recipient, the exact delivery timestamp, and whether and when the read receipt was acknowledged.