Hotmail was one of the first sites to offer free webmail. It was started by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith and went live on July 4, 1996. It was bought by MSFT in December 1997. Outlook is Microsoft's main email and personal information manager (PIM). It has always been included in Microsoft Office, as far back as Office 97. Outlook Express was a different client, created by the Internet Explorer team, which has since been replaced by the Windows Mail and\or Mail & Calendar apps. No telling how many times in the late 90s I went to help someone that "had a problem with my Outlook" only to find it was Outlook Express. At the time, MSFT had a thing for giving away free, stripped-down "Express" versions of their software (see also: FrontPage Express). Hotmail got a bad reputation for scammers, so MS rebranded it as "Windows Live Mail" in 2005. In 2012, Microsoft announced that they were getting rid of all the "Live' branding, and the new mail service would be Outlook.com. Its UI is based on Outlook Web Access, the webmail client of Microsoft Exchange. Having said that, Microsoft has never gotten rid of any old email addresses, so if you have a hotmail or live.com address, you can still login and get your email from the Outlook.com site. Answer from tunaman808 on reddit.com
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FOX 2
fox2now.com โ€บ news โ€บ hotmail-replaced-with-outlook-by-microsoft
Hotmail Replaced With Outlook By Microsoft | FOX 2
February 21, 2013 - NEW YORK, NY (CNN) โ€“ When Microsoft introduced a preview of its email service Outlook last year, it looked like its predecessor Hotmail would stick around. Now, Hotmail is being nudged out by Outlook. Hotmail will soon be a thing of the past.
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Does anyone know what the difference is between Hotmail and Outlook?
Hotmail was one of the first sites to offer free webmail. It was started by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith and went live on July 4, 1996. It was bought by MSFT in December 1997. Outlook is Microsoft's main email and personal information manager (PIM). It has always been included in Microsoft Office, as far back as Office 97. Outlook Express was a different client, created by the Internet Explorer team, which has since been replaced by the Windows Mail and\or Mail & Calendar apps. No telling how many times in the late 90s I went to help someone that "had a problem with my Outlook" only to find it was Outlook Express. At the time, MSFT had a thing for giving away free, stripped-down "Express" versions of their software (see also: FrontPage Express). Hotmail got a bad reputation for scammers, so MS rebranded it as "Windows Live Mail" in 2005. In 2012, Microsoft announced that they were getting rid of all the "Live' branding, and the new mail service would be Outlook.com. Its UI is based on Outlook Web Access, the webmail client of Microsoft Exchange. Having said that, Microsoft has never gotten rid of any old email addresses, so if you have a hotmail or live.com address, you can still login and get your email from the Outlook.com site. More on reddit.com
๐ŸŒ r/microsoft
57
54
August 4, 2021
Can't log in to hotmail/outlook
After the issues starting on the 10th/11th, I've been unable to log into my hotmail/outlook email account on my browser. Attempts at logging in get me to the loading screen (https://outlook.live.com/mail/0/) as per normal, which then redirects to theโ€ฆ More on learn.microsoft.com
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2
0
July 14, 2025
Hotmail/Outlook not working on iOS 15

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4
0
November 8, 2019
Outlook (Hotmail) Rules Not Working anymore?
Did you ever get a resolution for this issue? I've been experiencing the same thing for months now and I'm finally attempting to get it resolved but Outlook support is proving to be mindbogglingly incompetent and a gargantuan waste of my time. I'm trying to determine if I should just cut my losses and finally migrate everything to Gmail. More on reddit.com
๐ŸŒ r/techsupport
4
1
September 20, 2014
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Microsoft Outlook
outlook.com โ€บ mail โ€บ 0
Outlook
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Reddit
reddit.com โ€บ r/microsoft โ€บ does anyone know what the difference is between hotmail and outlook?
r/microsoft on Reddit: Does anyone know what the difference is between Hotmail and Outlook?
August 4, 2021 -

I was curious what the difference between the two are, Iโ€™ve read somewhere that outlook is also a website as well? Any help would be appreciated.

Top answer
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Hotmail was one of the first sites to offer free webmail. It was started by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith and went live on July 4, 1996. It was bought by MSFT in December 1997. Outlook is Microsoft's main email and personal information manager (PIM). It has always been included in Microsoft Office, as far back as Office 97. Outlook Express was a different client, created by the Internet Explorer team, which has since been replaced by the Windows Mail and\or Mail & Calendar apps. No telling how many times in the late 90s I went to help someone that "had a problem with my Outlook" only to find it was Outlook Express. At the time, MSFT had a thing for giving away free, stripped-down "Express" versions of their software (see also: FrontPage Express). Hotmail got a bad reputation for scammers, so MS rebranded it as "Windows Live Mail" in 2005. In 2012, Microsoft announced that they were getting rid of all the "Live' branding, and the new mail service would be Outlook.com. Its UI is based on Outlook Web Access, the webmail client of Microsoft Exchange. Having said that, Microsoft has never gotten rid of any old email addresses, so if you have a hotmail or live.com address, you can still login and get your email from the Outlook.com site.
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Hotmail is the old, now deprecated mail service of Microsoft. Existing hotmail addresses still work, but you can't create new ones. The outlook.com addresses are newer and the current default mail services domain name of MS. You can say the now both are the same regarding software (you have to use outlook.com for both and you get the same Microsoft account experience). Outlook is also the name of the mailing software (just to make things confusing) which is part of the Office package.
Hotmail was one of the first sites to offer free webmail. It was started by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith and went live on July 4, 1996. It was bought by MSFT in December 1997. Outlook is Microsoft's main email and personal information manager (PIM). It has always been included in Microsoft Office, as far back as Office 97. Outlook Express was a different client, created by the Internet Explorer team, which has since been replaced by the Windows Mail and\or Mail & Calendar apps. No telling how many times in the late 90s I went to help someone that "had a problem with my Outlook" only to find it was Outlook Express. At the time, MSFT had a thing for giving away free, stripped-down "Express" versions of their software (see also: FrontPage Express). Hotmail got a bad reputation for scammers, so MS rebranded it as "Windows Live Mail" in 2005. In 2012, Microsoft announced that they were getting rid of all the "Live' branding, and the new mail service would be Outlook.com. Its UI is based on Outlook Web Access, the webmail client of Microsoft Exchange. Having said that, Microsoft has never gotten rid of any old email addresses, so if you have a hotmail or live.com address, you can still login and get your email from the Outlook.com site. Answer from tunaman808 on reddit.com
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Microsoft
office.com
Login | Microsoft 365 Copilot
Collaborate for free with online versions of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and OneNote. Save documents, workbooks, and presentations online, in OneDrive. Share them with others and work together at the same time.
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Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org โ€บ wiki โ€บ Outlook.com
Outlook.com - Wikipedia
1 month ago - Outlook.com, formerly Hotmail, is a free personal email service offered by Microsoft. It also provides a webmail interface accessible via web browser or mobile apps featuring mail, calendaring, contacts, and tasks services.
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Microsoft 365
office365.austin.utexas.edu
Sign In
Select Outlook Web App to access your Office 365 mailbox. Select Office 365 Portal to download Microsoft Office and access other Office 365 services. Select Office 365 Management to manage settings for your mailbox(es), groups and other Office 365 services.
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Microsoft Support
support.microsoft.com โ€บ en-us โ€บ office โ€บ how-to-sign-in-to-outlook-on-the-web-763fab4d-0138-4814-b450-37fc286bcb79
How to sign in to Outlook on the web - Microsoft Support
Note: Outlook.com (or Hotmail.com) is the web-based version of Outlook which uses a personal Microsoft account such as an Outlook.com or Hotmail.com account to sign in. If you're trying to access your email, calendar, and contacts at Outlook.com (or Hotmail.com), see How to sign in or out of ...
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Google Play
play.google.com โ€บ store โ€บ apps โ€บ details
Microsoft Outlook - Apps on Google Play
Easily filter out unwanted spam email Planning & Calendar Management โ€ข See your various calendars side by side to help you schedule your day โ€ข Create and join your online video calls from Teams, Zoom, and Skype โ€ข RSVP to invites from your inbox & send personalized comments โ€ข Keep your weekly calendar and daily tasks organized with Outlook Task Organizer & Productivity Solutions - Intelligence Everywhere โ€ข Group same subject emails & conversations for easier tracking โ€ข Use your voice to find people, contacts, emails, events & attachments with Search โ€ข Use suggested replies to resp
Rating: 4.4 โ€‹ - โ€‹ 10.4M votes
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Microsoft account | Sign In or Create Your Account Today โ€“ Microsoft
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Top answer
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I just fixed mine (was on mac using Chrome Incognito)! To fix yours:
Visit that landing page's site settings (microsoft.com) and change it's permissions so that anything that's set to "Block" is changed to "Allow" instead.

To do this in Chrome, paste this into your chrome browser: chrome://settings/content/siteDetails?site=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.microsoft.com
(or while on any microsoft.com page like that landing page, click the settings symbol to the left of the url in the address bar and then click "site settings".)

I don't know for certain which permission(s) fixed it but I think you may only need to enable or Allow "Pop Ups & Redirects",
but it could have been any one of these permissions that I changed from "Block" to "Allow":

  • Notifications
  • Pop Ups & Redirects
  • Intrusive Ads
  • Insecure Content
  • Third Party Sign-in
  • Window Management

The above may have only helped me login to my hotmail (set up a passcode) in Incognito Chrome browser. Turns out I still had trouble outside of Incognito... so then I went and deleted all of the microsoft site data and was able to login outside of Chrome.

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>> This is purely a redirect issue on Microsoft's end.

You are correct. And it's like a plague. Do a search for "Can not logon to outlook.com deeplink=%2fmail%2f0" to see all the people having this problem.

The only solution that seems to work (sometime) is using your browser's Private/Incognito mode.

Or use the New Outlook for Windows App instead of a browser.
https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9nrx63209r7b?hl=en-US&gl=US

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Microsoft Support
support.microsoft.com โ€บ en-us โ€บ outlook
Outlook help & learning
*Copilot features in Outlook apply to accounts with @outlook.com, @hotmail.com, @live.com or @msn.com email addresses.
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Downdetector
downdetector.com โ€บ status โ€บ outlook
Outlook down? Current outages and problems | Downdetector
October 30, 2025 - Real-time problems and status for Outlook (formerly Hotmail). Is e-mail down? Can't log in or send e-mails? Here you see what is going on.
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Microsoft Support
support.microsoft.com โ€บ en-us โ€บ office โ€บ what-is-outlook-10f1fa35-f33a-4cb7-838c-a7f3e6228b20
What is Outlook? - Microsoft Support
Outlook for Microsoft 365 Outlook 2024 Outlook 2021 Outlook 2019 Outlook 2016 ยท With Outlook on your PC, Mac or mobile device, you can: Organize email to let you focus on the messages that matter most. Manage and share your calendar to schedule meetings with ease.