Email signatures in Microsoft 365

Email signature management in Microsoft 365 (Office 365) & Exchange Online

Company-wide email signatures in Microsoft 365/Office 365

Microsoft 365 native email signature functionalities & limitations

Microsoft 365 (Exchange Online) allows administrators to create and manage company-wide email signatures, but in a very limited way:

signatures can only be inserted at the very bottom of an email thread, which, with every new reply/forward message with a signature in it, leads to a growing signature pile at the end of this email conversation,

white spaces in signatures (left when no user attributes were pulled from organization’s Active Directory) cannot be removed on the fly,

images cannot be embedded in email signatures (recipients get them as attachments),

email signatures cannot be managed by non-admin Microsoft 365 users,

users cannot see their signature in their email client before sending an email and they can’t choose a different signature template.

How to set up email signatures in Microsoft 365 & Office 365?

Setting up an email signature using built-in Microsoft 365 features requires 2 basic steps:

Prepare the email signature source code (you can use our Email Signature Generator for Microsoft 365).
Set up the email signature as per this instruction.

Need more flexibility in email signature management?

The limitations mentioned above can be removed by using software such as CodeTwo Email Signatures 365. Watch an overview video and keep reading to learn more about the product and its advantages over native signature management options in Microsoft 365.

Native signature options in Microsoft 365 vs. CodeTwo Email Signatures 365

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Email signatures added right under the latest reply/forward message
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
Email signatures are inserted at the very bottom of an email thread.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
Email signatures are added right under the latest email.
Email signatures added with side banners
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
Side banners in emails are not supported.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
It’s not only signatures - you can also add side banners and email headers to your emails.
Convenient picker to select Active Directory placeholders
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
You need to type attribute names manually.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
All placeholders are grouped and you can insert them with one click.
White spaces in signatures removed automatically
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
If e.g. the mobilePhone value in Active Directory is empty, there’s white space in the signature.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
The text line where the mobile phone number was supposed to be can be removed (or, alternatively, replaced with a generic value).
Signatures visible while composing an email message
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
In Microsoft 365, you can’t preview signatures added server-side (in the cloud).
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
CodeTwo lets you preview signatures in Outlook & OWA as you type and see them in Sent Items.
100% GUI signature template editor
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
In Microsoft 365, you need to compose your email signature using raw HTML code with no formatting tools.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
With CodeTwo’s cloud service, you get a WYSIWYG signature template editor with dozens of professionally designed templates that you can quickly customize.
Logos and photos embedded in email signatures
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
Images added from an Internet source are not displayed in Outlook or OWA by default (you need to click “Download pictures” to see them).
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
Images and photos are embedded directly within the email body and are always displayed correctly.
Email signatures added directly in Outlook and OWA (option)
Microsoft 365 / Office 365 signatures
Adding client-side signatures is not possible in Microsoft 365.
CodeTwo Email Signatures 365
With CodeTwo, you can add signatures directly to Outlook & OWA to give users more control of their signatures.