If you don't like the way Outlook looks like by default, you might want to find out how you can change the fonts types, sizes and colors in Outlook to suit your taste better.
Most of them can be changed but the way to do it is scattered between various Windows and Outlook settings and even there they are not in a single location. This guide provides an overview how you can change which section of Outlook and if it needs to be done at Outlook level or at Windows level. Some sections can even be modified in multiple ways to reach the same results.
- Settings at Windows level
- Settings at Outlook level
- Main interface theme
- Mail item list
- Reading Pane
- Navigation Pane
- Calendar font type and size
- Calendar background color
- Calendar items background color
- Date Navigator/Side Calendar
- Notes fonts and background color
- To-Do Bar
- Tasks folders and To-Do list
- Writing emails
- Mark my comments with
- Background color for emails
- Search highlighting
- Fonts used when printing
Settings at Windows level
We begin with the settings at Windows since chances are that if you don't like the general font and color settings in Outlook, you probably don't like them in other applications either. By modifying the settings at Windows level, you change all the settings for all the applications (that respect the Windows settings) at once so you don't have to change it for each individual application.
Text size and the general interface
Modifying the size of the general interface, and thus also the font, is quite popular these days with monitors capable of very high resolutions. The higher your resolution settings, the smaller your letters will become. The solution is not to decrease your resolution settings as that will leave you with a less sharper image. Especially TFT/LCD-screens are designed to be ran in their highest resolution. The solution is to change the DPI settings in Windows.
Windows 7
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose "Screen Resolution".
- Click "Make text and other items larger or smaller".
- In the new window you can directly have 3 presets to choose from to make the fonts bigger. If you prefer a different font size you can click on the "Set Custom text size (DPI)" on the left and type any percentage you like.
Windows Vista
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Personalize.
- In the left pane called Tasks there is a task called Adjust font size (DPI). The shield in front of it indicates that you’re going to make a change that affects all users that will log on to this computer. If that’s ok by you, click the "Adjust font size (DPI)" link and press Continue or provide Administrator credentials to confirm making a system wide change.
- In the new dialog that popped up you can directly choose "Larger scale (120 DPI)…" to make the fonts bigger. If you prefer a different font size you can click on "Custom DPI…” and type any percentage you like.
Windows XP
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Properties.
- Select the Settings tab and click the button Advanced.
- In the new dialog that popped up you can directly choose "Larger scale (120 DPI)…" in the dropdown list to make the fonts bigger. If you prefer a different font size you can select "Custom DPI…” and type any percentage you like.
Zoom your interface to a readable size for your screen.
Themes in Windows
Outlook 2003 on Windows XP
For Outlook 2003 on Windows XP the main color of the interface integrates with the "Color Scheme" you have specified when your Theme is set to Windows XP. To change this color;
Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Properties-> tab Appearance-> drop down list: Color Scheme
Outlook 2003 on Window Vista and Windows 7
If you were to use Outlook 2003 on Windows Vista or Windows 7, the theme of Outlook 2003 would be "Baby blue" and is not sensitive to changes you make in the Aero color settings. In case you don't like the Baby blue, you can get a classic gray look in the following way;
Right click on the Outlook 2003 shortcut-> Properties-> tab Compatibility-> select: Disable visual themes
When you now start Outlook, it will load in classic mode (the look of Windows 2000 and earlier) without the themes and skinning. You can still further modify this as described in the next section.
Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010
Outlook 2007 comes with its own themes independent from Windows, but more about that later. The general Windows theme settings only limtedly affect the appearance of Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 even less.
Font type and colors
Changing the font style and color can be done for a big part via Windows settings as well, although it is only limited to the font size for Outlook 2007 for most of the settings and even less elements will be affected in Outlook 2010.
Windows 7
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Personalize…
- Click Window Color.
- If you are running the Aero interface, then you additionally need to click "Advanced appearance settings".
Windows Vista
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Personalize…
- Click Window Color and Appearance.
- If you are running the Aero interface, then you additionally need to click "Open classic appearance properties for more color options" and then the button Advanced…
Windows XP
- Right click on an empty spot on your Desktop and choose Properties.
- Select the Appearance tab.
- Press the Advanced button.
Menu item
You'll find that most of the fonts will change when you make changes to the "Menu" item settings (again; just the font size for Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010).
Window item
You can also change the "Window" color settings to get rid of a lot of the white in Outlook's interface. Note that although the background color of your message changes too, the receiver won't see this color unless you specifically set it when composing.
Note:
The font type of the Navigation Pane cannot be changed in Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007.
Changing the font color of the Navigation pane cannot be changed in Outlook 2010 via the Menu appearance item but can be set to white when you set your Office theme to Black.
Borders
When running the classic interface of Windows (or running Outlook with the Windows theme turned off), you can also modify the border colors here and even make them smaller by modifying the "Border Padding" size.
Clicking on the elements in the Advanced Appearance dialog
automatically selects the corresponding item in the dropdown list.
Settings at Outlook level
While you can change already quite a bit via the generic settings in Windows, there are also a lot of options within Outlook to make even more changes. Most of them are devoted to only a certain section within Outlook.
Main Interface Theme
Outlook/Office 2007 and 2010 come with 3 skinning themes of its own (blue, silver and black). The main reason for this was to accommodate for the new Ribbon and also for the changes between the Windows XP theming method and the Windows Vista theming method (and continued in Windows 7). The issues with the theming for Outlook 2003 between Windows versions is a perfect example of that. (There is more to that story but I'll leave it here.)
To change your Office theme;
- Outlook 2007
Start a new message-> press the Office logo at the left top-> Editor Options-> section: Popular-> Color scheme - Outlook 2010
File-> Options-> section: General-> Color scheme
Mail Item list
The mail items list is the main overview of all your mails in a folder. You can change the font type, size and color via the View settings in Outlook. These can be different for each folder or the same for all or just some of them. You can also set conditions to make some items stand out by using a larger font or by using a different color. To modify use;
- Outlook 2010
tab View-> button View Settings-> button Conditional Formatting… - Outlook 2007 and 2003
View-> Arrange By-> Custom…-> button Automatic Formatting… - Outlook 2002/XP and previous
View-> Current View-> Customize Current View…-> button: Automatic Formatting…
If you used the above method to change the text color of the Navigation Pane, then you can make the mail items list black again via Automatic/Conditional Formatting settings.
For more information about Automatic/Conditional Formatting see this guide.
Setting your Automatic Formatting color to Black instead of Auto
makes it stop using your default Windows font color.
Reading Pane
The font settings in the Reading Pane can be changed in various ways but depend on a lot of things. Changing the DPI settings in Windows is the best approach when the font in general is too small to read. If this is only on certain occasions when people are sending their mail in a font that is too small, then zooming those specific messages would be the way to go. If you don't like it that the display of the emails is at the mercy of the sender at all, then you can opt to have all your emails delivered in Plain Text instead and specify your favorite font, size and color to read and compose your messages in.
A description on how to use all these techniques can be found here.
Navigation Pane
As mentioned previously, in Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007, the Navigation Pane can only be modified via Windows settings.
In Outlook 2010 an option has been added in Outlook itself to directly modify the Navigation Pane font type and size. To do this;
tab View-> button Navigation Pane-> Options…-> button Font
Changing the font of the Navigation Pane from within Outlook 2010.
Note:
The font color of the Navigation pane cannot be changed direclty in Outlook 2010 but can be set to white when you set your Office theme to Black.
Calendar font type and size
To change the font type that is used in your Calendar, right click an empty space in your Calendar (I realize that might be a challenge for some people) and from the context menu choose Other Settings…
Here you can set different fonts for the Time, general text and your Monthly calendar. Additionally you can set if certain items should show in bold or not.
Other Settings dialog box for the Calendar
Calendar background color
To change the background color of the Calendar use;
- Outlook 2007 and previous
Tools-> Options…-> button: Calendar Options… - Outlook 2010
tab View-> button Color
Changing the background color of the calendar can also help to have the "Today" mark stand out a bit more for you.
Calendar items background color
In Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010, by default the background color of an item in the calendar will be the color of the last category that got assigned to the item.
Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2002/XP uses a predefined set of labels which you can assign directly to an individual item.
In case no category or label is assigned in the above mentioned versions of Outlook, you can use Automatic Formatting.
Outlook 2000 and previous do not have Automatic Formatting options available in the Calendar.
Date Navigator/Side Calendar
There are a couple of places where Outlook shows a small calendar which is officially called the Date Navigator;
- To-Do Bar in Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010
- Calendar Navigation Pane in Outlook 2010, Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2003
- TaskPad in Outlook 2003 and previous
You can control the font settings (but not the color) for this small calendar by going to;
- Outlook 2010
File-> Options-> section: Calendar-> option group: Display options-> button Font… - Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2003
Tools-> Options…-> tab Other-> button Advanced Options…-> button Font… next to the option Date Navigator
Note:
Setting this font also increases the font of the week numbers if you have the "Show week numbers" option enabled.
Custom styled Date Navigator in Outlook 2007
Notes fonts and background color
If you are using Notes, you've probably found out already that you can change the color of them. You can set the default background color and font settings via;
- Outlook 2010
File-> Options-> section: Notes and Hournal - Outlook 2007 and previous
Tools-> Options-> Notes Options…
To-Do Bar
The To-Do Bar in Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 actually consists out of 3 components. Each is controlled separately by a separate method.
- Date Navigator
Via the Date Navigator settings discussed previously here. - Appointments
The background color matches the Category color that is assigned to the item.
The font cannot be changed although the font color will change to white when the selected main category is one of the darker colors. - Task List
The Task List can be controlled by modifying the Automatic Formatting settings as discussed previously. To bring up that screen for the Task List, right click on the "Arranged By" header of the Task List and choose Custom…
Tasks folders and To-Do List
The main color for overdue and completed tasks can be set via Tools-> Options…-> button: Task Options…
In Outlook 2010 you can do this via; File-> Options-> section Tasks
Additional font settings can be set via Automatic Formatting.
Note:
The Tasks folder and the To-Do List can have different settings. In short, the difference between the Tasks folder and the To-Do List is that the To-Do list isn't an actual folder but is an overview of all the items that have been marked for follow-up. So besides tasks, there could also be emails shown in this overview which you mark differently via Automatic Formatting.
Writing emails
The default font settings for new emails, replies and forwards can be found in;
- Outlook 2010
File-> Options-> section Mail-> button Stationey and Fonts… - Outlook 2007 and previous
Tools-> Options-> tab Mail Format…
Here you can also make a selection out of available Stationery and Themes which can contain font settings and background settings of their own.
When you have installed a standalone version of Outlook, the "Theme…" button is not available. Not even when
you later install Word 2007/2010 as well. You'll need an Office 2007/2010 Suite which contains Outlook for it to be enabled.
While writing an email, you can of course still modify the font settings as well; that's obvious enough. If you cannot make any changes, your cursor is probably not in the message body or you are composing in Plain Text.
If you find the font settings when composing a new mail a bit too small, you might be easily tempted to increase the font size. At this point you should realize that the receiver will also receive it in that same size. If the font size is reasonable for emails already (somewhere between 8pt an 12pt for most fonts), then you might want to change your general DPI settings in Windows instead or change the zoom factor of your email.
Mark my comments with
When you have the "Mark my comments with" option enabled, the font settings that are used are the same as the font settings which you have set for forwards and replies as mentioned above.
Background color for emails
The way the background color can be changed when composing an email depends on your version of Outlook.
- Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010
Create a new message-> tab Options-> button: Page Color - Previous versions of Outlook
Create a new message-> Format-> Background-> Color
You can also set a picture to show as a watermark.
Search highlighting
When you use Instant Search in Outlook 2007 or Outlook 2010, the words you have used in your search query will be highlighted. To change the highlight color (or to turn this feature off completely) go to;
- Outlook 2010
File-> Options-> section Search-> option: Highlight search terms in the results - Outlook 2007
Tools-> Options…-> button: Search Options-> option: Highlight the words that I search for
Fonts used when printing
You can also specify several font settings when printing an email or an overview of your Tasks, Calendar or any other folder.
- An overview of a folder or list are printed via the Table Style
- An individual item will be printed in the Memo Style
- An individual item in the HTML format in Outlook 2003 or previous will be printed via the settings of Internet Explorer (allows no additional font settings)
- The Calendar holds several Printing Styles of its own
To change these Printing Styles use;
- Outlook 2010
File-> Print-> button Print Options-> Define Styles…-> select the Printing Style that you'd like to change-> button Edit… - Outlook 2007 and previous
File-> Page Setup-> Define Printing Styles…-> select the Printing Style that you'd like to change-> button Edit…
Tip!
When using Outlook 2007 or Outlook 2010, additional font settings and other formatting changes can be made when you print your calendar via the Calendar Printing Assistant for Outlook 2007, which is a free tool from Microsoft.
