If you cannot see group emails in your inbox, here’s an explanation and a fix that!
Group Emails
Group email is exactly what they sound like – emails that you send to a group rather than an individual. It’s almost the same feature as “distribution list,” which is the grouping of various contacts that you can send same emails to without adding each contact one by one. Although, distribution lists and Office groups also have some functionality differences too, we will leave that for another time.
This article discusses the issue of not being able to see the group emails in your inbox.
There are few distinct scenarios here, like: you sent an email to a group that you are also a member of, or that your group received emails but you cannot see them in your inbox.
As a recipient: check if you are subscribed or not!
Firstly, the most commonly and easily ignored mistake is unsubscribing to the group. The emails for the group that you cannot see, it’s likely that you at one time unsubscribed to that group and forgot about it. You will still receive those emails inside a shared inbox, but if you don’t want that, you need to subscribe to the group manually.
Do that by going into your Office 365 portal à either go to “People” or “Mail” à There will be a list of groups on the left pane. Click the group that you want to subscribe à then click the ‘gear/settings’ icon on the upper right section à and then select ‘Subscribe to this group by email.’
Now you will receive the emails sent to that group in your main inbox as well as in the shared inbox.
Also, if you are subscribed and still not receiving emails, you should try unsubscribing and then subscribing again. That often fixes whatever internal issue there was.
And if you are an admin for the group, you can also go to the “Edit Group” à and then check the checkbox labeled “send copies of all group messages and events to members.”
As a Sender: Not Receiving Mails in Inbox If You Are a Sender
Are you the one who send emails to a group and you are not seeing those emails in your personal inbox if you are also a member of that team?
Outlook changed the behavior some time ago that a sender won’t receive emails in inbox even if you are also a member. The obvious reason behind that decision that was a sender would always have those emails in their “Sent” folder.
In fact, there were many negative feedbacks regarding the sent emails being shown in their inboxes, so there were duplicated emails in their mailboxes (in Inbox and ‘Sent’ folders). But thankfully, Microsoft now gives you an option to keep a copy of emails in an inbox as well. Just go to Office 365 admin -> Settings -> Mail -> Groups -> “Send me a copy of email I send to a group.”