Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365 – Email forwarding is a valuable feature in Microsoft 365 that allows users to automatically forward incoming emails to another email address.
Enabling or disabling this functionality can be accomplished through the Microsoft 365 admin center or PowerShell. In this article, we will explore both methods to help you efficiently manage email forwarding.

Table of Contents
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365 – Read how to Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365:
Enable email forwarding in Microsoft 365
To set up email forwarding using Exchange Online Admin Center, follow these steps:
- Open a web browser and go to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, usually in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “recipients” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Locate and select the mailbox for which you want to configure email forwarding.
- Double-click on the mailbox to open its properties.
- In the mailbox properties window, navigate to the “Mailbox Features” tab.
- Scroll down to the “Mail Flow” section and click on “View details” next to “Mail forwarding”.
- In the mail forwarding window, enable the forwarding option and enter the desired email address where incoming emails should be forwarded.
- Optionally, you can choose whether to keep a copy of forwarded messages in the mailbox or not.
- Save the changes by clicking “OK”.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Enabling or Disabling Email Forwarding using PowerShell:
PowerShell provides an automated and scalable approach to managing email forwarding in Microsoft 365. Follow these steps to enable or disable email forwarding using PowerShell:
Open PowerShell
Launch PowerShell on your computer and ensure that you have the necessary permissions to manage Microsoft 365 Exchange Online.
Connect to Exchange Online
Run the following command to connect to Exchange Online
Connect-ExchangeOnline -Credential $Cred
Replace $Cred
with your administrator credentials.
Enable email forwarding
To enable email forwarding for a specific user, execute the following command:
Set-Mailbox -Identity "user@example.com" -ForwardingSMTPAddress "forward@example.com"
Replace “user@example.com” with the user’s email address and “forward@example.com” with the desired email address for forwarding.
Disable email forwarding
To disable email forwarding for a specific user, run the following command:
Set-Mailbox -Identity "user@example.com" -ForwardingSMTPAddress $null
Replace “user@example.com” with the user’s email address.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Enabling Email Forwarding Using Rules
- Log in to your Microsoft 365 admin account: Begin by logging in to your Microsoft 365 admin center using your administrator credentials.
- Access the Exchange admin center: Once logged in, navigate to the Exchange admin center. You can find it in the left-hand sidebar or by searching for “Exchange” in the admin center search bar.
- Open the Mail Flow settings: In the Exchange admin center, click on “Mail Flow” from the sidebar to display various mail flow options.
- Enable email forwarding: To enable email forwarding for a specific user, select “Rules” under “Mail Flow” and create a new rule by clicking on the “+” icon. Provide a name for the rule and specify the conditions for forwarding emails. Under the “Do the following” section, choose “Redirect the message to…” and enter the desired email address where you want the emails to be forwarded. Save the rule to enable email forwarding.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Disabling Email Forwarding using the Rules
- Access the Exchange admin center: Log in to your Microsoft 365 admin center and navigate to the Exchange admin center as explained earlier.
- Open the Mail Flow settings: Click on “Mail Flow” from the sidebar in the Exchange admin center.
- Disable email forwarding: To disable email forwarding for a specific user, select “Rules” under “Mail Flow” and locate the rule that forwards emails for that user. Edit the rule and under the “Do the following” section, select “Remove the redirect.” Save the changes to disable email forwarding.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
How to automatically forward emails in Outlook desktop
How to automatically forward emails in Outlook 2016
- Launch the Outlook desktop application on your computer.
- Locate and click on the “File” tab positioned at the top left corner of the screen.
- In the File menu, select “Manage Rules & Alerts” (for Outlook 2010 and later versions) or “Rules and Alerts” (for Outlook 2007).
- This action will open the Rules and Alerts window. Proceed by selecting the “New Rule” button.
- In the Rules Wizard, opt for “Apply rule on messages I receive” and click “Next.”
- Keep all checkboxes empty and proceed by clicking “Next” once again.
- You might encounter a warning message. If you want the rule to apply to all incoming messages, select “Yes” to proceed.
- In the subsequent window, scroll down and select the checkbox next to “forward it to people or distribution list.”
- Click on the “people or distribution list” link at the bottom of the page.
- Within the Rule Address window, input the desired email address for forwarding the emails and click “OK.”
- Click “Next” to proceed to the next step.
- Optionally, you can set exceptions if you wish to exclude specific scenarios from the forwarding rule.
- Choose a name for the rule and ensure the checkbox next to “Turn on this rule” is selected.
- Finally, click “Finish” to complete the setup.
Following these steps, all incoming messages to your Outlook mailbox will be forwarded to the designated email address.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Forward email to multiple addresses office 365 admin
Manage email forwarding multiple addresses
To forward emails to multiple addresses in Office 365 Admin, you can create a distribution group and configure email forwarding to that group. Here’s how you can do it:
- Open a web browser and navigate to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, typically in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “recipients” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Choose “Groups” or “Shared mailboxes” based on your requirements and preferences.
- Click on the “+” icon to create a new group or mailbox.
- Provide the necessary details for the group or mailbox, including display name and email address.
- Select the appropriate group type. For forwarding to multiple external recipients, choose “Distribution group”. For forwarding to multiple internal recipients within your organization, choose “Office 365 group” or “Security group”.
- Add members to the group by clicking on “Add members” or “Manage members”. Include the email addresses of the recipients you want to forward emails to.
- Save the changes and close the group or mailbox creation window.
- Locate and select the mailbox you wish to configure for email forwarding.
- Open the mailbox properties by double-clicking on it.
- Go to the “Mailbox Features” tab in the Mailbox properties window.
- Scroll down to the “Mail Flow” section and click on “View details” next to “Mail forwarding”.
- Enable forwarding by selecting the appropriate option and providing the email address of the distribution group or shared mailbox you created in step 7.
- Optionally, choose whether to keep a copy of forwarded messages in the mailbox or not.
- Save the changes by clicking “OK”.
By following these steps, you can configure email forwarding to multiple addresses by creating a distribution group or shared mailbox in Office 365 Admin.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Forward email to multiple addresses office 365 PowerShell
To forward an email to multiple addresses in Office 365 using PowerShell, you can follow these steps:
1. Open PowerShell on your computer.
2. Connect to your Office 365 account by executing the following command:
Connect-ExchangeOnline -UserPrincipalName admin@example.com
Replace admin@example.com
with the user principal name of your Office 365 administrator account.
3. Once connected, create a distribution group by running this command:
New-DistributionGroup -Name "ForwardingGroup" -Alias ForwardingGroup -PrimarySmtpAddress forwardinggroup@example.com
Choose a desired name for the distribution group by replacing "ForwardingGroup"
and assign the email address "forwardinggroup@example.com"
to it.
4. Add members to the distribution group using the following command:
Add-DistributionGroupMember -Identity "ForwardingGroup" -Member "user1@example.com", "user2@example.com", "user3@example.com"
Replace "ForwardingGroup"
with the name of the distribution group you created, and add the email addresses of the users you want to forward emails to.
5. Enable forwarding for the desired mailbox using this command:
Set-Mailbox -Identity "user@example.com" -ForwardingSmtpAddress "forwardinggroup@example.com" -DeliverToMailboxAndForward $true
Replace "user@example.com"
with the email address of the mailbox, you wish to forward, and “forwardinggroup@example.com” with the email address of the distribution group created in Step 3.
6. Save the changes by executing this command:
Set-Mailbox -Identity "user@example.com"
Replace "user@example.com"
with the email address of the mailbox, you configured for forwarding.
By following these steps in PowerShell, you can set up email forwarding to multiple addresses in Office 365.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
External email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a contact
Enable External Forwarding in Microsoft 365
To allow external email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a contact, you can follow these steps:
- Open a web browser and navigate to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, typically in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “recipients” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Choose “Contacts” and create a new contact by clicking on the “+” icon.
- Provide the necessary details for the contact, including the display name and the external email address.
- Save the changes and close the contact creation window.
- Go to “mail flow” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Click on “rules” and then create a new rule by clicking on the “+” icon.
- In the new rule window, assign a name for the rule.
- Under “Apply this rule if,” specify the conditions that determine which emails should be forwarded. For example, you can choose to forward emails sent to a specific internal user or emails with a specific subject line.
- Under “Do the following,” select “Redirect the message to” and click on the “Add…” button.
- Select the contact you created in step 5 from the list of available recipients.
- Save the changes by clicking “OK” or “Save”.
By following these steps, you can allow external email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a contact.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
External email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a remote domain
To allow external email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a remote domain, you can follow these steps:
- Open a web browser and navigate to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, typically in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “mail flow” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Go to the “Remote domains” tab.
- Click on the “+” icon to create a new remote domain.
- Provide a descriptive name for the remote domain in the “Name” field.
- Specify the domain you want to allow external forwarding to in the “Domain” field.
- Under the “Message Format” section, enable the options for “Allow automatic forwarding” and “Allow delivery reports” if desired.
- Save the changes by clicking “Save” or “OK”.
By following these steps, you can allow external email forwarding to a specific domain in Office 365 using a remote domain.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
How to Block Email Forwarding in Office 365
How to turn off email forwarding in outlook 365
To block email forwarding in Office 365, you can follow these steps:
- Open a web browser and navigate to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, typically in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “mail flow” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Go to the “Remote domains” tab.
- Locate and select the “Default” remote domain, which represents the default settings for all external domains.
- Edit the settings of the “Default” remote domain by clicking on the pencil icon or double-clicking on it.
- Scroll down to the “Message Format” section.
- Disable the option for “Allow automatic forwarding”.
- Save the changes by clicking “Save” or “OK”.
By following these steps, you can block email forwarding in Office 365 by disabling the automatic forwarding option in the default remote domain settings. This prevents users from automatically forwarding emails to external recipients.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365

How to Allow email forwarding Office 365
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
To allow email forwarding in Office 365, you can follow these steps:
- Open a web browser and navigate to the Microsoft 365 Admin Center URL, typically in the format:
https://admin.microsoft.com
. - Log in using your administrator credentials to access the Microsoft 365 Admin Center.
- Once logged in, click on “Admin centers” in the left-hand navigation pane, and select “Exchange” under “Admin centers”.
- In the Exchange admin center, click on “mail flow” in the left-hand navigation pane.
- Go to the “Remote domains” tab.
- Locate and select the “Default” remote domain, which represents the default settings for all external domains.
- Edit the settings of the “Default” remote domain by clicking on the pencil icon or double-clicking on it.
- Scroll down to the “Message Format” section.
- Enable the option for “Allow automatic forwarding”.
- Save the changes by clicking “Save” or “OK”.
By following these steps, you can allow email forwarding in Office 365 by enabling the automatic forwarding option in the default remote domain settings. This enables users to forward their emails to external recipients.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365

How to disable email forwarding Office 365 for all users
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
To disable email forwarding for all users in Office 365, you can use PowerShell to execute the following steps:
1. Open PowerShell on your computer.
2. Connect to your Office 365 account by running the following command:
Connect-ExchangeOnline -UserPrincipalName admin@example.com
Replace admin@example.com
with the user principal name of your Office 365 administrator account.
3. Once connected, retrieve a list of all mailboxes in your organization by running the following command:
$mailboxes = Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited
4. Iterate through the list of mailboxes and disable email forwarding for each user using the following command:
foreach ($mailbox in $mailboxes) {
Set-Mailbox -Identity $mailbox.Identity -ForwardingSmtpAddress $null -DeliverToMailboxAndForward $false
}
5. Allow the command to complete execution. This will disable email forwarding for all users in your Office 365 organization.
By following these steps in PowerShell, you can disable email forwarding for all users in Office 365. It is important to review and ensure that this action aligns with your organization’s policies and requirements.
Manage email forwarding in Microsoft 365
Conclusion
Managing email forwarding in Microsoft 365 is crucial for effective communication and streamlining your email workflow. Whether you prefer using the graphical user interface (GUI) through the Microsoft 365 admin center or the automation capabilities of PowerShell, these methods provide flexibility and control over email forwarding settings.
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