Exchange 2013 Public folder unable to access in Outlook 2016

Mariya Beckham ~ Modified: March 15th, 2016 ~ Tech Query ~ 2 Minutes Reading

Failure to Access Exchange 2013 Public Folder in Outlook 2016

From Exchange 2013, Microsoft introduced individual client settings for internal and external client for the Outlook Anywhere connectivity. Therefore, Outlook uses external namespace for connecting with public and auto-mapped mailboxes, even if it resides on the internal network.

At times, when Outlook 2016 users try to access the public folders of Exchange 2013, the user can encounter the following error:

Cause of the Error

Exchange 2013 public folders are not accessed in Outlook 2016 because the AutoDiscover service cannot search the email address that has been put on the public folder.

Resolution

The first resolution to avoid the occurrence of the issue is creation of AutoDiscover-related DNS records for the address that has been put on the public folder. In addition, the user can automatically configure user accounts in Outlook 2016. Autodiscover in Outlook 2016 is a XML file is saved at one of the two locations, on the basis of the domain name provided by user. The location of XML file depends on the email address that the user has provided. For instance, if the xyz.com is entered as the address, Outlook will look for the XML file at following locations:

The next step is to add the XML file reference in registry.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\AutoDiscover
REG_SZ: domain.com
Value: C:\path\to\autodiscover.xml

Now add the account to your Outlook profile via Auto Account Setup, and enter name, email address and password of the account.

The second method to overcome this error is by changing the email address of the public folder so that it matches the email domain that has published the AutoDiscover records correctly.

Conclusion

With the help of the above-mentioned resolution, you can access Public folders of Exchange 2013 in Outlook 2016.