Use a CNAME Record to Enable Outlook to Connect
Applies to: Office 365 for professionals and small businesses, Office 365 for enterprises, Live@edu
You can use CNAME records to let Outlook clients connect to the cloud-based service by using the Autodiscover service.
What is a CNAME record?
A CNAME or canonical name record is the DNS equivalent to a Microsoft Windows shortcut or an Apple Mac alias. A CNAME record is an alias for the Address (A) record that maps an IP address to the target server.
The target server doesn't have to exist in the same domain as the CNAME record itself. You can define an alias in one domain to point to a target server in a completely different domain. Many organizations use CNAME records with Web servers. An organization might point the alias www to a Web server that is hosted by a dedicated Web hosting company. For example, requests for www.contoso.com can be redirected to webserver1.fabrikam.com.
What do I need to support Outlook clients?
The cloud-based service uses a CNAME record to implement the Autodiscover service for Outlook clients. The Autodiscover service lets users configure their Outlook profile settings by simply entering their e-mail address and password into Outlook.
Note
In Microsoft Office 365 for professionals and small businesses deployments, Office 365 creates the required Autodiscover CNAME record for you if you chose to redirect your DNS hosting service to Office 365. However, you do need to set up your own Autodiscover CNAME record if want to use your own DNS hosting service rather redirect your DNS hosting service to Office 365.
See Add your domain to Office 365 without redirecting your name server records to Office 365 for detailed information.
The Autodiscover CNAME record must contain the following information:
- Alias
autodiscover - Target
autodiscover.outlook.com
Help for your users
After you've created the autodiscover CNAME record, point your users to Connect Outlook to This Account to help them connect.
What else do I need to know?
Here are some issues to be aware of:
- Manual configuration of the Exchange server name in Outlook isn't recommended. By using Exchange Autodiscover functionality, the cloud-based service can update the server infrastructure, such as the location of mailboxes, without affecting your users e-mail experience. If you don’t use Autodiscover, you may experience e-mail connectivity issues if the cloud-based service changes settings.
- The cloud-based service only supports Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010.
- For more information about how to download and install Outlook in Microsoft Office 365, see the following topics:
- If users have problems using Outlook to connect to their cloud-based mailbox, there may be Autodiscover issues.
- Check out the video Troubleshooting Autodiscover in Exchange Online.
- See Microsoft Knowledge Base articles 244404385 Outlook cannot configure a new profile by using Exchange Autodiscover for an Exchange Online mailbox in Office 365 and 2581088 How to troubleshoot issues that prevent you from viewing other clients' free/busy information in Office Outlook 2007 and in Outlook 2010 in an Office 365 environment.