How to Schedule an Email in Outlook and Gmail

In both Outlook and Gmail, you open the arrow beside Send, choose Schedule send and pick a time. Classic Outlook for Windows uses Delay Delivery instead. How to schedule an email in Outlook therefore depends on which Outlook you have, and so does whether your laptop must stay on.

A kitchen fitter in Worcester finishes a quote on Friday evening for a customer who checks email at 9am on Monday. From Gmail or new Outlook, it goes with the laptop shut. Classic Outlook's Delay Delivery holds it in the laptop's Outbox, and it leaves only if Outlook is open and online at 9am.

Where a scheduled email waits until it is sent

The email waits either with your email service or on your own computer. Only the second needs the computer switched on when the time comes.

App	Where the email waits	Sends with your computer off?
Gmail on the web, Android and iPhone	The Scheduled folder in your Google account	Yes
New Outlook for Windows, Outlook on the web, Outlook.com	Drafts, in your Microsoft mailbox	Yes
Outlook for Mac with an Outlook.com, Microsoft 365 or Exchange account	Drafts	Yes, even with Outlook closed
Classic Outlook for Windows, using Delay Delivery	The Outbox on your computer	Usually not: Outlook must be open and online at that time

Gmail's Scheduled folder belongs to your Google account, not to one device, so you can schedule on your phone and cancel on your laptop.

To tell the two Windows versions apart, look at the top right corner. A Settings button there means new Outlook, and no button means classic (which Outlook do I have?).

How to schedule an email in Outlook on the web and new Outlook

New Outlook and Outlook in a browser, at Outlook.com or through a work account, share one Schedule send button.

1. Write your message.
2. Select the dropdown next to Send, then Schedule send.
3. Pick a suggested slot or set a custom time.
4. Select Send to confirm.

The message stays in Drafts until it goes. In new Outlook, Microsoft says Schedule send is unavailable for accounts on POP or IMAP, two ways of connecting another provider's mailbox (Microsoft Support). No Schedule send button? Either you are on classic Outlook, covered next, or the address is one of those POP or IMAP accounts.

How to use Delay Delivery in classic Outlook

Classic Outlook relies on Delay Delivery rather than Schedule send. You give the message a time before which it must not leave.

1. In the new message, open the Options tab and choose Delay Delivery in More Options. No button? Use Message Options in the Tags group, or Options > More commands on the simplified ribbon.
2. Under Delivery options, tick Do not deliver before and set the delivery date and time.
3. Close the dialog, finish writing and press Send.

Outlook parks the message in the Outbox until then (Microsoft Support).

Does classic Outlook send a delayed email when the computer is off?

Usually not. Microsoft's note on the feature says Outlook needs to be online and connected.

A Microsoft 365 or Exchange mailbox does not change this by itself. In Cached Exchange Mode, the delayed message sits on your computer, not on the server (Microsoft troubleshooting, June 2025).

That mode is the default for Exchange and Microsoft 365 accounts, and Microsoft advises keeping it on. Outlook.com accounts use it permanently (Microsoft Support). With an Outlook.com address, Delay Delivery works on time only while Outlook is running. Only an Exchange or Microsoft 365 account switched to online mode, with the local cache off, hands the message to the server.

How to schedule an email in Outlook for Mac and the phone app

On a Mac, Schedule send sits on the Send button. According to Microsoft, the email goes even when Outlook is closed.

1. Add at least one recipient on the To line.
2. Open the Send dropdown and pick Schedule send (Send Later in older versions).
3. Enter when it should go and confirm.

Until then it sits in Drafts. You need Microsoft 365, or Outlook 2019 or later for Mac, plus an Exchange-based account such as Outlook.com.

Microsoft lists Gmail, Yahoo and iCloud among the accounts it won't work with. A Gmail address in the Mac app therefore has to be scheduled in Gmail (Microsoft Support).

On iPhone and Android, the Outlook app puts Schedule send under the … button while you write. Microsoft's Outlook team says the email sits in Drafts marked [Scheduled] and can be edited or deleted before it goes out (Outlook Blog, October 2022).

The app's Schedule swipe in the inbox is something else. That one hides a received email and brings it back later (Microsoft Support).

How to schedule an email in Gmail

Gmail offers Schedule send beside Send on a computer and from the More menu in the app.

On a computer

1. Click Compose and type your message.
2. Click the down arrow beside Send, bottom left.
3. Click Schedule send, then choose one of Gmail's times or set your own.

In the Gmail app

1. Tap Compose, bottom right.
2. When the message is ready, tap More (top right).
3. Tap Schedule send and choose an option.

Gmail moves it to the Scheduled folder, found in the left-hand panel and, in the app, under Menu. Google allows up to 100 scheduled emails and says one may go out minutes after the set time (Gmail Help). Neither Google nor Microsoft publishes how far ahead a send can be set.

How to change or cancel a scheduled email

Each app keeps scheduled messages in one folder, and in most of them you cancel the schedule before you edit.

App	Open the message from	To change it or send it now
Gmail	Scheduled	Click Cancel send and it becomes a draft. Edit it, then choose Schedule send again
New Outlook, Outlook on the web	Drafts	Select Cancel send, then Send to send it now, or edit it and schedule it again
Outlook for Mac	Drafts	Select Cancel Send and confirm. The message stays open to send now or schedule for another time
Outlook app on a phone	Drafts, marked [Scheduled]	Edit or delete it before the send time
Classic Outlook	Outbox	Open Message Options, change or clear Do not deliver before, then close the dialog and press Send

Which time zone the send time uses

Gmail sends at the chosen hour in the zone you scheduled it in, not the recipient's (Gmail Help). If your phone is on mainland Spanish time during a holiday, a reply set for 9am Monday leaves at 9am in Spain. That is 8am in the UK, so set 10am for a reply that should go at 9am UK time.

Microsoft's scheduling pages are silent on which zone Outlook uses. Before an email that must arrive at a set hour, check Outlook's own time zone. It sits under Settings > Calendar > View, or under File > Options > Calendar in classic Outlook (Microsoft Support).

Neither company's steps mention a zone for the person receiving it, so convert the hour yourself for the day of the send. New York is normally five hours behind the UK, but four for a few weeks each year.

American clocks change on the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November (National Institute of Standards and Technology). British clocks go forward and back on the last Sundays of March and October (UK government).

How to delay every email by a few minutes in Outlook

A classic Outlook rule holds everything you send for between 1 and 120 minutes, which is how you add a two-minute delay.

1. Choose File > Manage Rules & Alerts > New Rule.
2. Under Start from a blank rule, pick Apply rule on messages I send and click Next twice. Answer Yes when Outlook warns that the rule will apply to every message you send.
3. Tick defer delivery by a number of minutes, click "a number of", type 2 and confirm.
4. Click Finish and confirm Outlook's warning.

Microsoft calls it a client-side rule, which runs only while Outlook runs. Outlook must stay open for those minutes after you press Send (Microsoft Support).

Microsoft documents this rule for classic Outlook only and says the Mac version has none. Gmail has no rule either. Its nearest setting is Undo send, a window of 5, 10, 20 or 30 seconds under Settings > See all settings (Gmail Help).

Can you schedule emails on an iPhone?

Yes. Besides the apps from Google and Microsoft, Apple's own Mail app has a Send Later option.

In Mail, touch and hold the send arrow while writing and choose when it goes, or tap Send Later for more choices (Apple Support). Mail for Mac offers the same options next to Send and lists pending emails in a Send Later mailbox (Apple Support).

Apple's guides don't say whether the device must be switched on at that moment. For a message that cannot be late, Gmail or Outlook in a browser is the safer choice.

Scheduling a newsletter for a whole list

Schedule send suits a quote or a reply, not a newsletter to every customer. Scheduled from a mailbox, a newsletter usually leaves as one email with every address in Bcc. Microsoft and Google also cap how many people a mailbox can reach in a day (mass email from Outlook, Gmail's sending limits).

Mail that each person gets a day after signing up, or after any other event, comes from an email automation, not a scheduled send.

A MailGraf campaign is scheduled once for the whole list. Unlike Gmail and Outlook, MailGraf asks for the Recipient time zone and, if yours differs, shows your own time in the confirmation (Schedule a campaign).

For a newsletter that has to land at 9am for your whole list, the monthly plan is on the pricing page.