Prevent Outlook from adding line breaks

In my Outlook messages recently I have noticed that there are added line breaks after a certain number of characters. I suspect that these are being added to my outgoing messages only, not inbound messages, because inbound messages seem to have no added line breaks.

How can I determine if Outlook is adding line breaks to my outgoing message or if it is just the viewer showing the email as having line breaks in, but it does not actually have them?

Also, how can I disable the addition of line breaks either in the viewer or in the outgoing mail processor as the case may be?

Version is Microsoft Office 13

STEPS TO REPRODUCE

• create test email message with the following text (no line breaks)

1234567-10 234567-20 234567-30 234567-40 234567-50 234567-60 234567-70 34567-80 234567-90 23456-100 23456-110 23456-120 23456-130 23456-140 3456-150 23456-160 23456-170 23456-180 23456-190 23456-200

• send message to self

• message is received with the following line breaks (occurring every 70 characters):

1234567-10 234567-20 234567-30 234567-40 234567-50 234567-60 234567-70
234567-80 234567-90 23456-100 23456-110 23456-120 23456-130 23456-140
23456-150 23456-160 23456-170 23456-180 23456-190 23456-200

Note that I have Outlook set to use UTF-8 encodings. See below:

Also, I have tried modifying the setting "Remove extra line breaks in plain text messages." Whether the box is checked makes no difference.

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4 Answers

Outlook 2013: How can I disable the addition of line breaks either in the viewer or in the outgoing mail processor as the case may be?

How to prevent Outlook 2010 and 2013 from adding line breaks to sent plain text messages

When you send a plain text message, by default, Outlook will wrap text and insert line breaks at 76 characters. This might break your formatted paragraphs and URL links.

There is a solution which requires registry changes, however there also an option that fixes it without touching the registry. Here are the steps:

1. Click on the File tab and select Options.
2. Click on “Advanced” in the left column of the Options window.
3. Scroll down to the “International Options” section.
4. Change “Preferred encoding for outgoing messages” to “Unicode (UTF-8)”.
5. Click “OK” at the bottom of the Options window.
6. Restart Outlook

Note: This only works for Outlook 2013 and 2010. For older versions of Outlook (2007 and 2003), you have to use the registry tweak

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7

Line breaks are removed in posts made in plain text format in Outlook

Symptoms

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In Microsoft Outlook, you create a new plain text formatted post containing line breaks. Outlook removes the line breaks and displays the message. However, the posts do not display any indication that this has occurred, other than the change in formatting. The information bar message about extra line breaks does not appear, either in the Preview pane or when you read the post. This processing appears to happen when the message is initially posted.

Note E-mail message items display the information bar as expected when the line breaks are removed.

Cause

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By default, the Auto Remove Line Breaks feature in Outlook is enabled. This causes the line breaks to be removed. Any two or more successive line breaks are not removed.

Workaround

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Use one of the following methods to work around this behavior.

Note If you edit the existing post and you save the changes before you use one of the following methods, the line breaks are lost and can only be replaced manually.

Method 1. Disable the feature that removes extra line breaks

This method disables the feature for all plain text items. To do this, follow these steps:

For Outlook 2010 and later versions:

1. Open Outlook.
2. On the File tab, click Options.
3. In the Options dialog, click Mail.
4. In the Message format section, clear the Remove extra line breaks in plain text messages check box.
5. Click OK.

For Outlook 2007 or earlier versions:

1. Open Outlook.

2. On the Tools menu, click Options.

3. On the Preferences tab, click the E-mail Options button.

4. Click to clear the Remove extra line breaks in plain text messages check box.

5. Click OK two times.

Method 2. Use HTML or Rich Text format

You can use HTML or Rich Text formats when you create new items. Or you can change existing posts to these formats.

New posts

You can change the format for individual messages, or for all messages. To change the format for all messages, follow these steps:

For Outlook 2010 and later versions:

1. Open Outlook.
2. On the File tab, click Options.
3. In the Options dialog, click Mail.
4. In the Compose messages section, click either HTML or Rich Text in the Compose messages in this format drop-down list.
5. Click OK.

For Outlook 2007 or earlier versions:

1. Open Outlook.

2. On the Tools menu, click Options.

3. Click the Mail Format tab.

4. Click either HTML or Rich Text in the Message Format section.

5. Click OK.

When you create a post item you can change the format for an individual message. To do this, follow these steps:

For Outlook 2010 and later versions:

1. Open Outlook.
2. On the Home tab, click New Items, and under More Items click Post in This Folder.
3. On the Format Text tab, click As HTML or click As Rich Text in the Format section.

For Outlook 2007 or earlier versions:

1. Open Outlook.

2. On the File menu, click New, and then click Post in This Folder.

3. In Outlook 2007, click HTML or click Rich Text on the Options tab in the Format group. In Outlook 2003, or Outlook 2002, click Plain Text, and then click HTML or Rich Text.

Existing posts

• In Outlook 2007, click Other Actions after you open the post item on the Discussion tab in the Actions group. Then, click Revise Contents before you change the format.

• In Outlook 2003, or Outlook 2002, open the post item, click Edit, and then click Revise Contents before you change the format.

Method 3. Restore the line breaks in Outlook 2003 or Outlook 2002

This method allows you to restore the line breaks that were removed. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Open Outlook.
2. Open the post item.
3. Click Format.
4. Click to clear the Unwrap Text check mark.

Note This option is not available in Outlook 2010 or Outlook 2007.

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Further Sources

Short Version Quick List

1. Change the Automatically wrap text as text character to a longer character number than 70 to a more desired output (see below screen shot)
2. Uncheck the box option Remove extra line breaks in plain text messages (see below screen shot)
3. Use Rich Text or HTML format instead of Plain Text

In Outlook navigate: File | Options | Mail

3

This used once to work but I don't know if it still does :

In the registry create under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\<version>\Common‌​\MailSettings a DWORD called WrapLines and set it to 0.

If you need more information on how to do the above update to the registry, see this article and especially theDo It For Me section that contains .reg files for Outlook versions 2003 to 2013 that you can download and double-click to execute. For other versions of Outlook you will need to modify the version number in one of these files.

The file should look like this:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\<office-version>.0\Common\MailSettings]
"WrapLines"=dword:00000000

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You will need to change the way Outlook composes messages from "HTML" to "Plain Text." This is accomplished by selecting FILE : OPTIONS : MAIL. On the drop down menu, change HTML to Plain Text, then click OK. This should correct the extra line spaces. The spacing is not an issue when replying/forwarding to an email, only composing a new one.

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