Your workplace meetings should soon be a lot easier to manage thanks to a new Google Workspace update that brings Outlook users in from the cold.
The office software platform has announced a tweak that will help Outlook work more seamlessly with Google's calendar app, with meeting organizers from the latter now actually appearing in Google Calendar meeting events.
As the company notes in an update blog post, if a Microsoft Outlook user previously invited a Google Calendar user to a meeting event, the Outlook user’s display name would not appear at all in the list of meeting attendees on Google Calendar - but this is all about to change at last.
Better together
Now, thanks to the new Google Workspace update, any Outlook user who organizes a meeting will now actually be listed amongst the other meeting attendees in Calendar as the meeting organizer.
The change, which is rolling out now and doesn't require any action on behalf of the user, will affect all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts.
It's such a simple function that we're amazed Google and Microsoft haven't made this work before, and no doubt it will be a huge boost to users everywhere. The two platforms had previously announced how Outlook and Google Calendar would look to work closer together, with a May 2023 update allowing better interoperability, namely by allowing users in both systems to share their availability status, so everyone can view each others' schedules.
The news is the second significant recent boost for Outlook users looking for a better way to sync their calendars with collaboration services, after Microsoft Teams also revealed a new tweak that should make syncing your Outlook email calendar with Teams much more straightforward.
With the update, Microsoft says that any changes you make to your calendar in Outlook will be reflected in your Teams calendar in real-time, and vice-versa, ideally spelling an end to any embarrassing mix-ups.
