-->![2016 2016](/uploads/1/1/1/9/111950285/174670291.jpg)
![Mac Mac](/uploads/1/1/1/9/111950285/567957105.jpg)
Original KB number: 3009176
Symptoms
Applies to: Office for Mac, Office 2019 for Mac, Office 2016 for Mac. To use Office for Mac in your organization, it needs to be activated. How you activate Office for Mac depends on whether your organization has an Office 365 (or Microsoft 365) plan or has a volume license agreement. But in both cases your users won't have to enter any product.
![2016 2016](/uploads/1/1/1/9/111950285/174670291.jpg)
After you migrate to Microsoft Outlook 2016 for Mac from Outlook for Mac 2011, you notice that the category colors that are assigned to your categories are changed.
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- Office 2016 for Mac support is ending soon. Upgrade to Microsoft 365 to work anywhere from any device and continue to receive support. Install Office 2016 on a Mac. Once the download has completed, open Finder, go to Downloads, and double-click MicrosoftOffice2016Installer.pkg (the name might vary slightly).
Cause
Mac 2016
Outlook for Mac 2011 uses a local list of categories. The names of these categories are synchronized to the server that's running Microsoft Exchange Server when they're assigned to items. This makes the names visible on different clients and devices. However, the colors for these categories aren't synchronized to Exchange.
Outlook 2016 for Mac uses the Master Category List (MCL) that's stored on the Exchange server to synchronize the category names and colors.
So when you migrate from Outlook for Mac 2011 to Outlook 2016 for Mac, any local category names that are assigned to items are merged with the MCL. Random colors are assigned to these categories because the colors from Outlook for Mac 2011 aren't synchronized.
Mac For 2016 Download
Resolution
Update the colors that are assigned to categories in the MCL in Outlook 2016 for Mac. To do this, follow these steps:
- On the Home ribbon, click Categorize > Edit Categories.
- If you have more than one account that's added to Outlook 2016 for Mac, make sure that the correct Exchange account is selected.
- For each category for which you want to change the color, click the color block, and then select the color that you want.
- Make any additional changes that you want by changing the names of categories and by adding or removing categories, as appropriate.
- Close the Categories window.
The changes that you make should be saved in the MCL and should be viewable from other clients and devices.
More information
Mac 2016 Charger
In Outlook for Mac 2011, thousands of colors can be assigned to local categories. In Outlook 2016 for Mac, 25 predefined colors can be assigned to MCL categories. These colors are predefined by the Exchange server MCL.
![Mac Mac](/uploads/1/1/1/9/111950285/567957105.jpg)
If you have an IMAP or POP account that's set up in Outlook 2016 for Mac, local categories are used. So you can select from thousands of colors for these categories.