How to create auto bcc rule in outlook 365

Many people have found that BCCing or CCing yourself into emails that you send can be one of the most useful things to do in order to stay on top of all your emails. This works especially well if you want to remember to follow up a certain email. Although many people understand that adding your own email address as BCC is a practical way of keeping your emails in order, it is often overlooked when sending important emails. This can be one of the reasons why following up an email is so easily forgotten by many people, which often leads to problems down the line. In order to avoid such issues, this blog post will outline a step by step tutorial on how you can create a new rule for your inbox to allow you to automatically BCC or CC yourself into emails that you send.  

Creating a new rule to automatically BCC or CC yourself into emails:

1. Sign into your Outlook 365 account and got to ‘Settings’ on the right hand side of the top panel
2. At the bottom of the window, click ‘View all Outlook settings’ 
3. From the left hand side column, select ‘Email’
4. Then, from the column next to it, select ‘Rules’
5. Select ‘Add new rule’
6. In the first box, add a name for the rule
7. In the second box where it says ‘Add a condition’, select ‘Apply to all messages’ from the drop down list
8. In the third box where it says ‘Add an action’, select ‘Copy to’
9. Another box will appear next to it. Click in the box and select ‘Inbox’ from the drop down list.
10. Then click ‘Save’ at the bottom of the window 

We’ve also created a handy video that walks you through the steps outlined here. You can watch it here on our YouTube:

Creating ‘Exceptions’

When creating a new rule to automatically BCC or CC yourself into your emails, there is also an option to add exceptions. In this context, exceptions can be thought of as the opposite of adding conditions. This is where you can select a situation in which you do not want the email to automatically BCC or CC you into an email. Outlook 365 allows you to do this by filtering through your emails in your selected method. For example, from the list of exceptions if you select ‘subject includes’ and then add a specific keyword, You will not be sent emails that include that word within the email subject. 

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Step by step process of Creating a new rule to automatically BCC or CC yourself into emails:

1. Sign into your Outlook 365 account and got to ‘Settings’ on the right hand side of the top panel

For the purpose of this tutorial, I will be singing into Outlook 365 using an example account.

1. Click ‘View all Outlook settings’ 

Once the Settings tab has opened, select ‘View all Outlook settings’ which can be located at the bottom of the screen.

1. From the left hand side column, select ‘Email’

When the window opens, select ‘Email’.

1. Then, from the column next to it, select ‘Rules’

1. Select ‘Add new rule’

1. In the first box, add a name for the rule

As an example, I have added the name ‘Automatic BCC’.

1. In the second box where it says ‘Add a condition’, select ‘Apply to all messages’ from the drop down list

There are also many other interesting conditions that you can set for your emails, such as filtering your emails to automatically organise themself based on the keywords within the subject or the body of the email.

1. In the third box where it says ‘Add an action’, select ‘Copy to’

At this point, you can choose what happens to the emails that you’ve previously set conditions for. Here, we want to ensure that an email sent by yourself ends up in your own inbox as well as to the recipient, however, there is no direct command to do this. Instead, we have to program Outlook 365 to copy the email to your inbox as well.

1. Another box will appear next to it. Click in the box and select ‘Inbox’ from the drop down list.

Other options include ‘Deleted items’ and ‘Archive’ which can be useful for creating other rules if needed.

1. Then click ‘Save’ at the bottom of the window 

Your new rule has now been created and the emails you send will also appear in your own inbox.

The effect of BCC in your inbox

Changing the rules and settings of your email to fit your own specific needs can prove to be a huge advantage and can result in boosting your productivity. It can ensure that your inbox is organised in a clear and concise way that is filtered to your own specific method, which is essential to making you feel organised with your work. Outlook 365 also has a variety of other cases you can set up for your email other than creating an automatic BCC. If you do decide to tweak other settings of your email in addition to settings up and automatic BCC, it is important to check that the commands to do overlap with those that have been set up for the automatic BCC, as this will contradict the actions needed to be taken to copy the emails into your inbox. 

Avoid overflowing your own inbox

Another important thing to note about the automatic BCC setting is that it might be worth monitoring the ‘Exceptions’ option in the settings to further define the kind of emails that get sent to your own inbox. If your automatic BCC has been set up to send you very specific emails, it be a huge help in organising your inbox, however, if done in a general way that copies all of your sent items into your own inbox, it can result in flooding your inbox and resulting in poor organisation and management of your email. 

Thank you for reading! We hope you found this blog post useful in setting up your automatic BCC. If you have any further questions, feel free to leave a comment and we’d be happy to help.