Every time I open my free Outlook account, I see the same thing: a tall banner ad on the right side eating up screen space, a suspicious-looking "email" at the top of my inbox that's actually an ad, and a persistent "Upgrade to Microsoft 365 Premium" banner below my folder list.
Microsoft puts these ads in free Outlook accounts to push you toward a paid subscription. Fair enough — they need to make money somehow. But the ads are aggressive. The fake email ads are designed to look like real messages, which is genuinely annoying.
Here are three ways to get rid of them, ranked from least to most effective.
Before picking a solution, it helps to know what you're dealing with. Outlook web (outlook.live.com) shows four distinct types of ads on free accounts:
| Ad Type | Where It Appears | How Annoying |
|---|---|---|
| Sidebar banner (160x600) | Right side of reading pane | Moderate — takes up screen space |
| Fake email ad | Top of inbox, looks like a real message | High — designed to trick you into clicking |
| Upgrade banner | Below folder list in left sidebar | Low — small but persistent |
| "Ad Choices" label | Near the sidebar ad | Low — just text, but reminds you ads exist |
The sidebar banner is the most visible. The fake email ad is the most deceptive — it sits right in your inbox with a tiny "Ad" label that's easy to miss. The upgrade banner nags you to pay for Microsoft 365.
The first thing most people try is a general-purpose ad blocker. uBlock Origin is the gold standard — it's free, open-source, and blocks ads across the entire web.
How to set it up:
What it catches: Sidebar banner ads (the 160x600 display ad on the right). uBlock's filter lists include rules for common Microsoft ad domains.
What it misses: The fake email ads at the top of your inbox. These are rendered by Outlook's own code as part of the message list — they're not loaded from a separate ad domain, so filter-list-based blockers can't distinguish them from real emails. The "Upgrade to Premium" banner and "Ad Choices" label also tend to survive.
Extensions built specifically for Outlook know the exact DOM elements Microsoft uses for ads. They don't rely on filter lists — they target Outlook's internal markup directly.
There are a few options in the Chrome Web Store. Outlook Power Tools is one that I use — it removes all four ad types and also adds productivity features (email templates, quick steps, PDF export, keyboard shortcuts).
How it works:
What it catches: All four ad types — sidebar banner, fake email ads, upgrade banner, and "Ad Choices" label. It works by injecting CSS rules that target Outlook's internal ad containers using their aria-label attributes and element IDs.
What it misses: Nothing that I've seen so far. If Microsoft changes their ad markup (which they do occasionally), the extension would need an update.
The nuclear option: pay Microsoft to stop showing you ads.
A Microsoft 365 Personal subscription costs $6.99/month or $69.99/year. It removes all ads from Outlook web and desktop, plus you get 1 TB of OneDrive storage, access to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and other Microsoft apps.
If you already need Office apps, this makes sense. If you just want to get rid of Outlook ads and don't care about the rest of the bundle, it's expensive for what amounts to ad removal.
| Factor | uBlock Origin | Outlook Power Tools | Microsoft 365 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free | $6.99/month |
| Sidebar banner ads | Removed | Removed | Removed |
| Fake email ads | Not removed | Removed | Removed |
| Upgrade banner | Partially | Removed | Removed |
| "Ad Choices" label | Not removed | Removed | Removed |
| Works on desktop app | No (browser only) | No (browser only) | Yes (everywhere) |
| Extra features | Blocks ads on all sites | Templates, PDF, shortcuts, unread badge | Office apps, 1 TB storage |
| Setup time | 30 seconds | 30 seconds | 5 minutes + payment |
| Breaks Outlook UI? | Rarely | No | No |
My recommendation: use both uBlock Origin and a dedicated Outlook extension. uBlock handles ads across the web, and an Outlook-specific extension catches the ads that uBlock misses inside your inbox. They don't conflict with each other.
Microsoft introduced ads in free Outlook (then Hotmail) accounts back in the early 2010s. The rationale is straightforward: running a free email service for hundreds of millions of users costs money, and ads offset that cost.
The problem is how those ads are implemented. Sidebar banners are standard web advertising — most people can live with them. But the fake email ads that Microsoft inserts into your inbox cross a line. They're styled to look like real emails, with a sender name, subject line, and preview text. The only difference is a small "Ad" label that's easy to overlook.
Microsoft knows this is annoying — that's the point. The more annoying the ads, the more likely you are to pay for Microsoft 365 to make them go away. It's a feature, not a bug.
The new Outlook desktop app for Windows is essentially the web version (outlook.live.com) wrapped in a desktop frame. So yes, it shows the same ads as the web version — sidebar banners, fake email ads, upgrade banners.
Browser extensions can't directly modify the desktop app since it runs in its own window, not in Chrome or Edge. Your options for the desktop app are limited to:
Most people I know who care about ads have switched to using Outlook in the browser full-time. The web version and the desktop app are functionally identical, and the browser gives you access to extensions.
No. Ad blockers are client-side tools that modify how your browser displays a webpage. Microsoft's servers don't know whether an ad was displayed or hidden — they only know whether the ad was loaded, and CSS-based blockers don't prevent loading (they just hide the element after it loads).
Ad blocking extensions have been around for over a decade. No email provider has ever banned accounts for using them. The Chrome Web Store hosts dozens of ad-blocking extensions for Outlook and Gmail, and Google (which runs the store) hasn't removed them.
Not easily. The Outlook mobile app doesn't support extensions. Some system-level ad blockers (like AdGuard for iOS or DNS-based blockers like NextDNS) can block some Outlook ads on mobile, but results are inconsistent. The most reliable mobile solution is a Microsoft 365 subscription.
No. CSS-based ad blockers like the one in Outlook Power Tools add a tiny style sheet (a few hundred bytes) that hides ad elements. There's no performance impact — emails load at the same speed.
This happens occasionally. When it does, dedicated Outlook extensions need to update their CSS selectors to match the new markup. uBlock Origin relies on community-maintained filter lists that also get updated. In my experience, Outlook ad markup changes every few months, and extensions catch up within a week or two.
Yes. The ad blocker is one of several features. You don't need to use the templates, quick steps, or any other feature — the ad blocker works on its own and is completely free. You can toggle it on/off in the extension's Settings tab.
Blocks all Outlook ad types. Also adds email templates, PDF export, quick steps, and keyboard shortcuts.
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