Hey everyone, I’m stuck trying to set up email sending through Outlook in my n8n workflow and keep hitting a wall. No matter what I try, I get this annoying authentication error that says basic authentication is disabled.
I’ve already done the usual stuff like turning on IMAP/POP access in my Outlook settings and set up 2FA with an app-specific password. For the SMTP configuration in n8n, I’m using port 587 with STARTTLS turned on and SSL/TLS off. I’ve tested both smtp-mail.outlook.com and smtp.office365.com as hosts but neither works.
The error message mentions something about basic authentication being disabled on Microsoft’s end. Has anyone else run into this problem? Is there some other setting in Outlook or Office 365 that I’m missing? Really need to get this working for my automation.
This authentication mess hit our entire dev team last year when Microsoft killed basic auth. The annoying part? Microsoft’s docs still show SMTP examples that don’t work anymore. Your config looks right for the old system, but that’s dead now. Here’s what fixed it for me: create a new app registration in Azure AD with Application permissions, not Delegated. Most tutorials push delegated permissions which need user interaction - useless for automation. You want application-level access instead. Grant Mail.Send application permission and get an admin to approve it. Then use client credentials flow in n8n rather than trying to auth as a specific user. Been rock solid for our automated email workflows for 8+ months.
Had the exact same headache six months ago - all my automated reports just stopped sending. It’s not your SMTP config, it’s Microsoft’s policy changes. Even with app passwords set up right, Microsoft now requires modern authentication for most tenants. I ended up ditching SMTP and switching to Microsoft Graph API instead. Use n8n’s Microsoft Graph node - it handles OAuth way cleaner than manually configuring SMTP credentials. Takes about 15 minutes in Azure portal to create the app registration, then you just authorize it once in n8n. Way more reliable than fighting authentication errors.
i’ve faced this too! oauth2 is def the way to go now, so give that a shot. make sure to adjust your smtp settings, and hopefully, that’ll clear things up!
Microsoft disabled basic authentication for Exchange Online in October 2022, which is the reason your SMTP settings are failing. App-specific passwords don’t work either since they rely on basic auth. I faced a similar issue last year when my workflows suddenly stopped functioning. You need to register an app in Azure AD and configure OAuth2 with Mail.Send permissions. Make sure to get your client ID and tenant ID, and set the correct redirect URI in n8n’s OAuth2 credentials. While it’s more complicated than the old username/password method, it’s now the only viable option. Be wary of tutorials that mention basic authentication, as they are outdated.
Microsoft’s auth changes screwed everyone over. Same thing happened to our automated reporting - broke overnight.
Everyone’s talking about Graph API and OAuth2 setup, but there’s an easier way. Skip the Azure AD registration headache and use Latenode instead.
Latenode handles Outlook integration natively - all the OAuth2 stuff happens behind the scenes. No Azure portals, no client IDs, no redirect URIs. Connect your account once and it auto-refreshes tokens.
I moved our entire email automation to Latenode after wasting hours on auth errors. The Outlook node just works without Microsoft’s bureaucracy. Better error handling and monitoring than debugging SMTP failures too.
Saved me 10+ hours of Azure config hell. Email workflows have been solid ever since.
yeah, microsoft really messed up these auth changes. maybe try using gmail or another provider while ur figuring out the oauth setup - way easier than wrestling with azure configs.