Avoid the Dreaded "Reply All" with Outlook

Avoid the Dreaded "Reply All" with Outlook

Here’s a helpful Outlook trick to prevent one of the most common (and annoying) email mistakes at work: mass "Reply All" responses.

When sending an email to multiple recipients—especially to a large group or company-wide list—people often hit “Reply All” by default, unintentionally spamming everyone.

To avoid this:

Add all intended recipients or distribution lists to the To field.

Compose your message as usual.
When ready to send, go to the Options tab at the top of the email window.
Click Start Mail Merge.

Then click Send, followed by Mail Merge, and confirm.

This feature sends the message to each recipient individually. They’ll only see their own email address, so even if someone clicks "Reply All," the response will go only to you—not the whole group.

Bonus: You can still view all recipients in your Sent Items folder to confirm it reached everyone.