Developers can now add mobile support to their Outlook add-ins

Microsoft today announced the availability of add-ins in Outlook for iOS that helps you transform your inbox into a “do-box” and accomplish tasks quickly. Add-ins for Dynamics 365, Nimble, Evernote, Smartsheet and GIPHY are now available for Outlook on iOS. Microsoft is also allowing developers to build their own Outlook add-ins based on their apps and services. Since Outlook add-ins are built using standard HTML and JavaScript, they run on Outlook experiences across phones, tablets, desktops, and the web with almost same code with minor modifications to fit the mobile form factor.

Microsoft today posted the below steps for developers who are interested in bringing their add-ins to Outlook for mobile.

1. Add-ins that support mobile must pass a strict set of validation criteria, so we encourage you to share your scenario ideas and mockups for pre-approval before you start implementation, using the form at https://aka.ms/outlookmobileaddin.
2. Decide what scenarios to enable on mobile. Not every action makes sense on the small screen, so be sure you’re highlighting the most important functionality of your add-in for mobile. Keep in mind that only mail read scenarios are supported right now.
3. Update your manifest to declare support for the Mobile Form Factor and define the actions you came up with in step 1.
4. If applicable, make sure any backend calls to the mailbox are using our REST API. EWS requests are not supported on mobile.
5. Build mobile-specific UI for the small screen using our design guidelines.
6. Submit your add-in to the Office Store for validation. You can find instructions here.

Add-ins support is also coming to Outlook for Android soon. Learn more about it here.