Regression in New Outlook: Unable to decline meetings with comments

IVAN LARZABAL GOÑI 0 Reputation points
2026-03-31T12:10:50.81+00:00

In the classic Outlook client, declining a meeting allowed the user to add a short explanatory message to the organizer. This basic and widely used workflow has been removed in the New Outlook.

In the current New Outlook experience, selecting Decline immediately sends the response without giving any opportunity to add a comment. This forces users either to decline without context (which is unprofessional in many business environments) or to send a separate email before declining.

This is a clear functional regression, not a UX preference:

  • The feature existed for years in Outlook classic
  • There is no equivalent workflow in the new UI
  • Microsoft moderators have confirmed this limitation and suggested workarounds instead of a proper solution

For users who manage many meetings, this significantly degrades communication quality and adds unnecessary friction.

Expected behavior: When declining a meeting, users should have the option to:

  • Decline and send no response
  • Decline and send a response with comments (single-step)

Impact:

  • Poor professional communication
  • Additional manual steps (extra emails)
  • Regression compared to Outlook classic

Please consider restoring this functionality or providing an equivalent option in New Outlook.In the classic Outlook client, declining a meeting allowed the user to add a short explanatory message to the organizer. This basic and widely used workflow has been removed in the New Outlook.

In the current New Outlook experience, selecting Decline immediately sends the response without giving any opportunity to add a comment. This forces users either to decline without context (which is unprofessional in many business environments) or to send a separate email before declining.

This is a clear functional regression, not a UX preference:

  • The feature existed for years in Outlook classic
  • There is no equivalent workflow in the new UI
  • Microsoft moderators have confirmed this limitation and suggested workarounds instead of a proper solution

For users who manage many meetings, this significantly degrades communication quality and adds unnecessary friction.

Expected behavior:
When declining a meeting, users should have the option to:

  • Decline and send no response
  • Decline and send a response with comments (single-step)

Impact:

  • Poor professional communication
  • Additional manual steps (extra emails)
  • Regression compared to Outlook classic

Please consider restoring this functionality or providing an equivalent option in New Outlook.

Outlook | Windows | New Outlook for Windows | For business
0 comments

2 answers

Sort by: Most helpful
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Helen Luu 2,695 Reputation points Independent Advisor
    2026-03-31T15:13:56.8366667+00:00

    Hello @IVAN LARZABAL GOÑI
    Based on your description, I understand that you are experiencing an issue with declining a meeting while also sending a message to the organizer.
    To decline a meeting and include a note, you can choose the option “RSVP with note to organizer.” This option allows you to include a personalized message along with your response. Once selected, you will then be prompted to choose whether you would like to accept, tentatively accept, or decline the meeting. Your note will be sent to the organizer together with your selected response, ensuring that your message is properly communicated. User's image

    User's image

    Using this feature is particularly helpful if you would like to explain your unavailability or provide additional context when declining a meeting invitation.

    I hope this information clarifies the process and helps resolve your concern. Please feel free to reach out if you have any further questions, require additional clarification, or need assistance with anything else.

    If the answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and kindly upvote it. If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment" 

    Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.  

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
  2. Stéphane Vanrechem 0 Reputation points
    2026-09-09T06:26:45.7666667+00:00

    In addition to IVAN's remarks. We are Sept 9th 2026. New Outlook is still having huge regressions compared to the old one.

    THAT IS NOT NORMAL AFTER 18 months of release!

    1. INVITE THEME: When inviting message are sent to your email .ics files are undowloadable in Outlook. The file is sometimes completely missing from the inviting message making it a real pain to update your agenda properly.
    2. INVITE THEME: There is an automatic cancellation message sent to the organizer of the meeting. How come when there is another invite that you accepted it is very confusing!
    3. MESSAGE NAVIGATION: Navigating buttons on the current open message bar have disappeared you cannot go to the next of the previous message directly. You must close the windows and double click on the message you need to open. Does Microsoft wants every citizen using Outlook going to the hospital to get their finger surged because of intense mouse clicking!

    These are the 3 obvious regressions that make Outlook use a real pain after several months of use. Don't be mistaken I am for the future but a future without regressions and in this case although I am sure there are other ones FIXING NEW OUTLOOK BECOMES URGENT if you want people continue using this messaging tool. You need to tell your vibe coders to fix things and rapidly!

    I look forward to get the REAL release roadmap fixing these issues.

    Thank you.

    Stéphane Vanrechem

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments

Your answer

Answers can be marked as 'Accepted' by the question author and 'Recommended' by moderators, which helps users know the answer solved the author's problem.