Latest macOS Office Insider Preview Build brings a number of new features to Outlook

Microsoft has released Office for Mac (Insider Fast builds) Version 16.42 (20093000, 20092705, 20092300, 20092101). The company has also highlighted all the new features and bug fixes that come with the latest macOS Office Insider Preview Builds. The updates include no know issues. You can see the official changelog below.

Changelog

Outlook

New features

• The new Outlook for Mac gets an update to the user experience to align better with the UX changes within MacOS Big Sur. Crafted specifically for the Mac, you will now find rounded corners in the buttons, message list, and conversation pane that are influenced by Big Sur. We have also incorporated friendly and modern Fluent icons that establish a consistent experience across our products and services.

• Natural Language Search: With Natural Language in search, you simply type the way you would ask a question/statement, no syntax needed. We take the guesswork out of choosing the right words and understand your intents expressed naturally.

• Saved Search (aka Smart Folders): A Saved Search, also known as a smart folder or a search folder, is a virtual folder that dynamically displays a set of search results. For example, you could create a search to find all the items in the Manager category. This search can be saved as a Saved Search so that you can use these search criteria later without having to manually re-create the search.

• iCloud Support: Add your iCloud account in the new Outlook, supporting mail, calendar, and contacts sync. If your account is already added in the current Outlook, you will be prompted to migrate it into the new Outlook. Requires M365 subscription activation.iCloud account added:

Bug fixes

• Mail Sounds: play a new mail sound for new messages when arriving in Inbox OR Focused Inbox (if enabled)
• Add-ins: when the user attempts to track a meeting to a Dynamics record, they will no longer be asked to resend the meeting invite
• Accounts: fixed the crash when click on Google Cloud Cache account in Accounts prefs
• Attachments: fixed an issue so that users can open the attachment from the messages
• Contacts: added VoiceOver to the Birthday/Anniversary fields to announce the date type
• Contacts: fixed unexpected keyboard focus on hover action for call/email/chat on people list
• Mail: insert table is now enabled when composing a mail in nested compose window
• Added a feature for on-prem users who don’t have office identity to activate Microsoft Teams feature
• Attachments: added toast to let users know that attachment download is in progress if it is taking more than 3 secs to open an attachment/s. We shall no longer show an error if the attachment/s opens.
• Mail: added VoiceOver announcement, color contrast ratio and enlarge text on hover for MailTips
• Added support for preflighting auth for an HTTP connection using NTLM
• Contacts: mapped “In messages from my contacts” in Current Outlook to “Never” in Phoenix
• Calendar: location Pills are now clickable in plain text locations
• Calendar: fixed crash caused when clicking on “Done” in “View all Proposals” page

Known issues

None

To update to the latest Office Insider Preview Build, open any Office program and go to File> Account> Update Options> Update Now.