Lightning for Outlook
Lightning for Outlook is a retired Salesforce product name, not a feature you can switch on today.
Definition
Lightning for Outlook is a retired Salesforce product name, not a feature you can switch on today. From 2016 it labelled the Microsoft Outlook add-in, the panel that shows CRM records beside an open email. The Winter '19 release notes announced the replacement name: Outlook Integration.
Nothing was withdrawn. The add-in still matches the people on an email to contacts and leads, and still logs that message against Salesforce records. Only the branding moved, and with it the Setup page, now called Outlook Integration and Sync.
A runbook that tells you to enable Lightning for Outlook predates Winter '19.
In plain English
“Companies rename things. Salesforce built a small tool that shows customer details next to your email in Outlook. In 2016 it was called Lightning for Outlook. A couple of years later the name became Outlook Integration. Same tool, different label.”
Worked example
An admin at a 400-seat logistics company inherits a 2017 rollout plan that says to enable Lightning for Outlook for the Inside Sales profile. She types Lightning into Setup's Quick Find box and gets nothing. Typing Outlook returns the page that holds the setting, under a name the plan never mentions.
Following the name from 2016 to today
Which product a 2017 document actually means
Salesforce has shipped more than one Outlook connector and the names overlap badly. Salesforce for Outlook is a Windows desktop app, installed per laptop, and it retires in December 2027. The add-in is a different animal: one Microsoft 365 application approved for the whole tenant. Lightning for Outlook always meant the add-in. Get that wrong and you plan a migration nobody needs.
What the Winter '19 rename changed
Salesforce stripped the Lightning prefix from its email products in that release. Lightning for Outlook became Outlook Integration and Lightning for Gmail became Gmail Integration. A separate release note records that the Setup page was renamed to match. That is why an old configuration guide names a page you cannot find.
Why old guides with this name are risky
The panel behaviour a 2017 guide describes is mostly still accurate. The plumbing around it is not. Lightning Sync, the sync engine of that era, stopped accepting new customers in Winter '21. Salesforce now points new setups at Einstein Activity Capture. Microsoft is retiring Exchange Web Services too, so Office 365 connections have to move to Microsoft Graph.
Trust & references
This term has been renamed to Outlook Integration and Sync.
View current pageCross-checked against the following references.
- Salesforce Winter '19 Release Notes (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Salesforce and Microsoft Outlook Integration Products (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Salesforce for Outlook Retirement (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Lightning Sync Retirement: Not Available for New Salesforce Customers as of Winter '21 (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Microsoft Exchange Web Services (EWS) Retirement and Salesforce Outlook Integration (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Explore Email and Calendar Integration Products (opens in new tab)Salesforce
- Outlook Integration and Outlook Integration with Inbox (opens in new tab)Salesforce
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Lightning for Outlook.
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Lightning for Outlook.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He writes and edits salesforcedictionary.com, published by KineticBit Inc., to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
Test your knowledge
+5 pts / dayQ1. A 2017 admin guide tells you to enable Lightning for Outlook. What happened to the product?
Q2. What is the relationship between Lightning for Outlook and Salesforce for Outlook?
Q3. An org still running the sync setup described in a Lightning for Outlook era document should move to which engine?
Discussion
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