How to Attach a SharePoint File to Outlook Emails (Video)

Video Transcript

Hi there! I’m Ashlyn with Fixed Fee IT. Welcome back to our series on everything you need to know about SharePoint. Today, we’re walking through how to attach a file in Outlook from SharePoint, both in the Web App and Desktop App. If you’re looking for a specific section of this tutorial, hover over the progress bar and select the part you need. Otherwise, let’s get started

How to Attach a SharePoint File From the SharePoint Web Application

First, let’s walk through how to attach a file straight from SharePoint. To start, we’ll head over to the specific file in SharePoint. I recommend sharing just the file and not this entire folder for security reasons. Let’s say I accidentally save something very private to this folder. Well, anyone with the link to this folder will be able to view that sensitive information. So, that’s why we only attach specific files.

Here we go, we want to attach this file. Hover over it, and you’ll notice this little share icon. When we click that, a box will pop up with all sorts of options. I want to draw attention real quick to this option. This controls who can access this document thru the link we share. I have it set up where only people on the Fixed Fee IT team can view this document. However, I also have the option of allowing specific people or only people with existing access. You might have the option where anyone with the link can access it. This comes with potential security risks, so I highly recommend you avoid this option unless absolutely necessary.

You’ll also have the option to allow editing. If this box is left unchecked, it will be a read-only document for them.

Let’s apply that and go back to this screen. You can share by adding someone’s email here, which will send an automated email to that person. But let’s say we want to attach it to an email with some more information. So We’re going to click the “Outlook” button at the bottom here. You could also copy the link, which is a bit more manual. Let’s go ahead and click the outlook button.

This will open our outlook in a new tab. As you can see, it’s attached a live link that that file. We can add a recipient, subject, everything in a normal email and send it. When the other person receives this email, they will click that file and it will open it in the SharePoint web app.

How to Attach a SharePoint File From Office Desktop Applications

Now let’s walk through how to do the same thing but in our desktop app. If we head over to word, I already have the same file open. If you look in the upper right-hand corner, you’ll notice the same “share” icon we saw earlier. Click that, and hopefully, everything looks familiar.

Once again, when we click that, a box will pop up with all sorts of options. This controls who can access this document thru the link we share. Let’s apply that and go back to this screen. You can share by adding someone’s email here, which will again send that automated email to them. But we can also attach it to a prewritten email. So this time let’s click the “copy link” button.

Now we’ll head over to Outlook and create a new email. Recipient, subject, all that email stuff. Paste that link into the body of the email. It should initially be a SharePoint link but will reconfigure to look like an attachment, like so. Finish up the body of your email, and you’re all set. When the other person receives this email, they will click that file and it will open it in the SharePoint web app.

How to Attach a SharePoint File Directly in Outlook

Next, we'll walk through how to attach a SharePoint file directly in Outlook. First, let's open an email we want to add the file to. Then, we'll click the little paperclip icon towards the bottom. This gives us a few options including some recent files we worked on. If the desired file isn't here we can also click browse cloud locations and navigate through our groups to find that file. You'll click it, add it, and then it's ready to send.

How to Make & Share a Copy of a SharePoint File

Finally, if you want to share a copy of a SharePoint file with somebody without giving them access to the original it's also really simple. Let's find a SharePoint file we want to copy. To do that we'll again go down to the paperclip icon below and then find the file by selecting browse cloud locations. Again, we'll go through the group section to find the file we want and then select it. Then we'll click the arrow to the right of the attached file and select "attach as a copy". This will create a separate copy of the SharePoint file which will then be sent to your recipient. Any edits they make to their version will not affect your version.

And that’s all I have for you in this section. Now you should be able to attach SharePoint files to Outlook. Check out our other SharePoint tutorials in our playlist. If you still have questions, feel free to reach out to our team at Fixed Fee IT. Thanks for watching!