Microsoft Outlook For Apple Watch One-Ups Apple’s Native Email Client

Though Microsoft sells its own smartwatch – the Microsoft Band – the company has been eager to support the Apple Watch as well as smartwatches that use Google’s Android Wear mobile OS for wearables. It offers enough to expand the email notification experience to the Watch, which is what Outlook didn’t have before now.

Microsoft has been pretty aggressive lately with its softwares and services that are increasingly being opened up for rival platforms, the company today updated its Outlook app for iOS which now features support for the Apple Watch. With the app’s latest update, though, that has completely changed.

Most importantly, the app lets you browse and read full emails right from your wrist. Beneath that, the app also offers you a calendar view. It’s also from the full app that replies are available via canned responses and dictation. You can visit an “Other” tab to the see the rest, however. You can configure custom notifications for important messages.

Through Outlook on Apple Watch users can look at their email, go through notifications of incoming emails and also send limited replies. (Which frankly, I don’t find myself doing a lot.) The Glance displays your emails and your next calendar appointment, which makes it a multi-functional widget. Outlook is based on Acompli, which Microsoft acquired in 2014, and has been recognized as one of our Apps of the Week.

Along with this app update, Microsoft has launched wearables.office.com, a dedicated page that lists all the different Office apps available for Android Wear and Apple Watch, along with what features each supports.