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A Modern, People-First Inbox in Outlook 2013

By Johan van Soest.

Published : 2014-03-14.

Last updated : 2017-05-02.

In Outlook 2013, Microsoft overhauled the message list, focusing on the way most people use it.

Microsoft has heard from customers that the unread status is extremely important when you are reading emails, so they made sure the unread mails in your inbox stand out by using Outlook's new blue color for both text, and a visual bar to the left of each message. The bar makes it easier than ever to focus on the unread messages. Also the blue bar gets wider when hovering the mouse over it. Clicking the blue bar will toggle the read/unread status. read status inbox Outlook

Problem showing the unread blue bar.

When in Outlook 2013 no blue bars are showing the unread status in both compact and single preview, try this easy fix:
You might be using a very wide screen to run Outlook 2013 on. When the message list is wide, the blue bars showing the unread status are hidden by default. Just reduce the width of the message list by dragging the right side and the unread blue bars magically appear again.

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