Double new email and calendar notifications on Windows 8
For some of my new emails, I receive multiple new email alerts. These alerts come at the same time or within seconds from each other.
When I check in Outlook, I can see that I only received the message once. I also have no rules configured in Outlook to display a New Mail Alert for certain messages.
How can I get rid of these double alerts?
Most likely this second alert isn’t actually coming from Outlook but from the Windows Mail app. The same can happen for calendar alerts coming from the Windows Calendar app.
When you logon to Windows 8 with your Microsoft Account, it will also try to automatically configure the Windows Mail and Calendar app with those credentials. If it was successful, then you’ll get New Email Notifications and appointment reminders for both Outlook and the Windows Mail or Calendar app.
There are 3 options to get rid of these duplicate alerts:
- Disable alerts for the Windows Mail and Calendar app.
- Disable alerts for the mail account in the Windows Mail app.
- Remove the mail account from the Windows Mail app.
Option 1: Disable alerts for the Windows Mail app
This is the easiest way to go when you just want to get rid of all the Notifications which the Mail app might generate.
- Open the Charms bar by placing your mouse in the top or bottom right corner of your screen, by swiping in from the right or by pressing CTRL+C.
- Choose: Settings
- Choose: PC Settings
- Choose: Search and apps
- Choose: Notifications
- When you scroll down, you’ll see a list of all your apps which can generate notifications. Set the one for Mail to Off.
- If your mail account is an Exchange Active Sync account (for instance, when your mailbox is hosted on an Exchange server or on Outlook.com), also disable the notifications for the Calendar app.
- While you are there, you may also want to disable some additional apps to get rid of any other unwanted notifications.
When you use Outlook, turn off the notification for the Mail and Calendar app to prevent being alerted twice for the same email or appointment.
Extra tip: You can also remove the New Mail counter of the Mail app from the Lock Screen by choosing “PC and devices” in “PC settings”, then select “Lock screen” and click on the Mail envelope in the “Lock screen apps” section. From the pop-up select: Don’t show quick status here
Leaving the Calendar app on the Lock Screen could be beneficial since Outlook isn’t able to show them there.
Option 2: Disable alerts for the mail account in the Windows Mail app
Another way to go would be to disable the alerts for the mail account configured in the Mail app.
- Open the Mail app.
- Open the Charms bar by placing your mouse in the top or bottom right corner of your screen, by swiping in from the right or by pressing CTRL+C.
- Choose: Settings
- Choose: Accounts
- Click on your mail account.
- Set the “Show email notifications” option to: Never
- Repeat the above for each account that you have configured.
Option 3: Remove the mail account from the Windows Mail app
If you don’t intend to ever use the Mail app, then you might as well remove the mail account from it.
- Open the Mail app.
- Open the Charms bar by placing your mouse in the top or bottom right corner of your screen, by swiping in from the right or by pressing CTRL+C.
- Choose: Settings
- Choose: Accounts
- Click on your mail account.
- Scroll all the way down in the list of options.
- Click on: Remove account
Note: You can’t remove your main account. However, you can untick the box for “Email” in the “Content to sync” section of the account settings.
The same can be done for the Calendar when you are using an EAS account but you might want to leave it on so that it can sync your Calendar for the Lock Screen. In that case, turn off the notifications for the Calendar app as instructed above.
