Add additional email aliases to a user

Add additional email aliases to a user

A primary email address in Microsoft 365 is usually the email address a user was assigned when their account was created. When the user sends email to someone else, their primary email address is what typically appears in the From field in email apps. They can also have more than one email address associated with their Microsoft 365 for business account. These additional addresses are called aliases. You can create up to 400 aliases for a user. No additional fees or licenses are required. This article is for Microsoft 365 administrators who have business subscriptions. It's not for home users.

For example, Jenna at your organization has the email address jenna@contosoco.com, but she also wants to receive email at jen@contosoco.com because some people refer to her by that name. You can create aliases for her so that email sent to both email addresses go to Jenna's inbox.

No additional fees or licenses are required. 

TIP: If you want multiple people to manage email sent to a single email address like info@contoso.com or sales@contoso.com, create a shared mailbox.  To learn more, see Create shared mailboxes in Office 365.

Add email aliases to a user

You must have admin permissions in Office 365 to do this.

  1. In the admin center, go to the Users > Active users page.
  2. On the Active Users page, select the user you want to manage.
  3. Under Aliases and select Manage username and email. You won't see this option if the person doesn't have a license assigned to them.
  4. On the Manage username and email page, add the new alias in the Username field, select a domain and choose Add.
  5. When you're done, choose Save changes. It usually takes about 24 hours for the new aliases to update.
    The user will now have a primary address and an alias. For example, all mail sent to jenna@contoso.com, and her alias, jen@contoso.com, will go to Jenna's inbox. When the user replies, the From address will depend on her Outlook client. Outlook on the web will use the alias at which the email was received. Outlook desktop will use her primary email alias.

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