Emails are not scanned client-side by Outlook 2016 for Mac to determine if they are junk email. Exchange servers provide server-side junk mail filtering, and most popular email providers, such as Hotmail,, Gmail, and Yahoo, provide server-side junk mail filtering, making client-side Outlook junk filtering redundant.
Instead, it relies solely on the mail server to perform all junk email filtering. Outlook 2016 for Mac does not provide any client-side junk mail protection for any type of account (Exchange, POP, or IMAP). Client-side junk filtering takes place on the client (such as Outlook & Outlook for Mac) when the email is downloaded from the server to the client. Server-side junk filtering takes place on the mail server (such as Exchange) as soon as email arrives in the mailbox. The first item to understand is that there are two types of junk email filtering: sever-side and client-side. Here's some information from one of Microsoft's blog posts about this issue: Microsoft does not support Junk mail settings in Outlook 2016 for Mac. Outlook 2016 for Mac does not support client-side junk email settings. The option exists but you can not click the + or.
The Junk Mail settings in Outlook 2016 are not available when using Bowdoin mail.
