Microsoft Outlook is charging an exorbitant price to expand storage — and people are furious

Microsoft Outlook is overpriced
Office 365 (Image credit: Microsoft)

Microsoft's Outlook email service has caused some controversy. In 2013, the company implemented a 15GB storage space limit when it migrated from Hotmail to Outlook. Although that might not have seemed like a problem back then, it's NOW causing some issues for users who are receiving emails that they're reaching their storage limit, as reported by TechRadar.

The issue is the price of upgrading Outlook storage space, and many users have to either spend a good chunk of time deleting old emails or paying up for Outlook 365. It costs $69.99 a year, by the way. This service also gives you access to the full Office suite, but it only increases email storage from 15GB to 50GB.

Considering this is the only way to upgrade Outlook storage, it's no wonder people are furious, especially when Microsoft's largest competitor offers a far superior deal.

Gmail also starts at 15GB in its free plan, but if you happen to reach this limit and don't particularly care for deleting old emails, you can upgrade to 100GB for $19.99 a year. This provides double the amount of space for less than a third of the price when compared to Outlook. 

However, keep in mind that this storage space limit is shared with Google Drive as well, meaning that all of that space could easily get used up if you're frequently uploading large files onto the cloud. 

Additionally, Microsoft has its own cloud service that comes with Microsoft 365 called OneDrive, and the $69.99 subscription gives you 1TB of storage space. Regardless, Google still offers a cheaper alternative for those looking to just upgrade their email storage space.

This means Outlook users who have reached their storage limit are in a bit of a predicament. They can either start a yearly subscription for $69.99 or begin working through deleting their emails, many of which have probably been there for ten or so years.

Claire Tabari
Contributing Writer

Self-described art critic and unabashedly pretentious, Claire finds joy in impassioned ramblings about her closeness to video games. She has a bachelor’s degree in Journalism & Media Studies from Brooklyn College and five years of experience in entertainment journalism. Claire is a stalwart defender of the importance found in subjectivity and spends most days overwhelmed with excitement for the past, present and future of gaming. When she isn't writing or playing Dark Souls, she can be found eating chicken fettuccine alfredo and watching anime.