The AOL Mail Connection (Nov-29-2005)

You're here to make the AOL mail connection. America Online has a proprietary mail format, but has made it possible for you to connect to their mail system with Outlook. They do so through an IMAP interface. Outlook and AOL don't handle mail identically, so there are some things you should be aware of. These are listed in the AOL Notes section at the end of this page.



Follow these steps to connect Outlook to your existing AOL account:

1. In the Outlook main menu, click Tools, then E-mail Accounts. This launches the E-mail Accounts wizard.
   
   
2. Select Add a new e-mail account, then click Next.
   
   
3. Select IMAP, then click Next.
   
   
4. Enter your name as you want it to appear in messages in the Your Name field.
   
   
5. Enter your full AOL mail address, which is your screen name followed by "@aol.com", in the E-mail Address field.
   
   
6. Enter your AOL screen name in the User Name field.
   
   
7. Enter your AOL password in the Password field.
   
   
8. Enter "imap.aol.com" in the Incoming mail server (IMAP) field.
   
   
9. Enter "smtp.aol.com" in the Outgoing mail server (SMTP) field.
   
   
10. Click More Settings to open the Internet E-mail Settings dialog box.
    
    
11. Click the Outgoing Server tab.
    
    
12. Set the My outgoing server requires authentication check box.
    
    
13. Select Use same settings as my incoming mail server.
    
    
14. Click the Advanced tab.
    
    
15. Change the number in the Outgoing server (SMTP) field to 587, then click OK.
    
    
16. Click Next then Finish.

Outlook can now talk to your AOL Inbox.

AOL Notes

• AOL and Outlook handle deleted messages differently. You can eliminate deleted messages on both the AOL and Outlook side simultaneously. In Outlook, click File, then Purge Deleted Messages.
  
  
• You can create folders and move files in Outlook and have the changes show up in AOL. However, the only place AOL will allow Outlook to make these kinds of changes is in the Saved folder in Outlook. Such changes show up in the Saved on AOL folder of America Online.
  
  
• Outlook doesn't have a Report Spam button like AOL mail does. To mark messages from your AOL account that you read in Outlook as junk. move them to the AOL Spam folder
  
  
• The Unsend and Status buttons from AOL are not available in Outlook.

• Return to the POP3, HTTP, and IMAP Accounts page.
  
  
• Return to the top of this AOL Mail Connection page.