While it's often useful to link to an image, note that thanks to the security features in Outlook and many other email clients, users may choose to not download your image. For this reason, we recommend using the default setting to send embedded images. This will insure they see your images.

Also note that you’re not going to make many friends if you start adding 30kb graphics to the end of every message you send. Use this feature wisely.

Outlook 2007 & 2010 | Outlook 98 or 2000 | Outlook 97 | More Information

Outlook 2007 & 2010

In Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 you can set Outlook to use images from the Internet, however it must be configured in the Registry.

Open the registry editor, if using Outlook 02007, browse to

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Outlook\Options\Mail

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Outlook\Options\Mail

Right click on the Mail key and choose New, DWORD and create a value named

Send Pictures With Document

The default value will be 0, which is the value we want. When the value is 1 or if its missing, images are embedded with the message, not linked.

You’ll need to restart Outlook after changing this registry key.

Do It For Me

If you don’t want to edit the registry, we have a ready-to-use registry file you can download, then double click to run. We recommend right clicking on the link and choosing Save Link As (or Save Target as).

Send-Pictures-With-Document-2007 Send-Pictures-With-Document-2010

Don’t forget to restart Outlook.

Create a signature with a linked image

To create a signature with an image stored on a web server, create your signature using an image placeholder then edit the signature file. I like to create a web page with only the image in it then open it in IE and copy the image and paste it into the signature. After saving the signature, open the associated HTML file in notepad and change the path.

In Windows 7 & 8, the signature files are at
C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Signatures

At the end of the HTML page, you’ll see text that looks something like the following. Find the two references to the image (src=”New%20Signature_files/image001.gif”) and change it to use the web address. (If you pasted the image from a webpage, the image location is included in the signature code.)

</v:shapetype><v:shape id="_x0000_i1025" type="#_x0000_t75" alt=""
 href="http://www.slipstick.com/" style='width:112.5pt;height:27pt' o:button="t">
 <v:imagedata src="New%20Signature_files/image001.gif" o:href="http://www.slipstick.com/images/sliplogo.gif"/>
</v:shape><![endif]--><![if !vml]><span style='mso-ignore:vglayout'><img
border=0 width=150 height=36 src="New%20Signature_files/image001.gif"
style='border-bottom-color:#889DB2;border-bottom-style:solid;border-bottom-width:
1px;border-left-color:#889DB2;border-left-style:solid;border-left-width:1px;
border-right-color:#889DB2;border-right-style:solid;border-right-width:1px;
border-top-color:#889DB2;border-top-style:solid;border-top-width:1px' v:shapes="_x0000_i1025"></span><![endif]></span></a></span><span
style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:
"Times New Roman";color:white;><o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

</div>

</body>

</html>
<br />

Outlook 98 or 2000

For an HTML signature:

1. Choose Tools | Options | Mail Format.
2. Make sure the default format is set to HTML.
3. Click Signature Picker.
4. On the Signature Picker dialog, select the signature, then click Edit.
5. On the Edit Signature dialog, click Advanced Edit. This will open the .htm file for the signature in your system’s default HTML editor.
6. Use your HTML editor’s tools to insert a graphic.
7. Save the file and click OK until you return to Outlook.

If you don’t have an HTML editor, you can locate the .htm file for the signature in your Windows\Application Data\Microsoft\Signatures folder, then edit it in Notepad to add an HTML image tag like this:

<img border="0" src="file:///E:/Pix/Sliplogo.gif">

You can also use either of these techniques to add other HTML tags to your signature — to play sounds, run marquees and generally make a signature so busy and junky that people stop reading your mail.

For an RTF signature:

1. Choose Tools | Options | Mail Format.
2. Make sure the default format is set to Rich Text.
3. Click Signature Picker.
4. On the Signature Picker dialog, select the signature, then click Edit.
5. On the Edit Signature dialog, click Advanced Edit. This will open the .rtf file for the signature in your system’s default RTF editor, Word or WordPad.
6. Use the editor’s tools to insert a graphic.
7. Save the file and click OK until you return to Outlook.

Articles that may interest you:

iCloud and Outlook Problems: Syncing Calendar

iCloud and Outlook Problems: Syncing Contacts

How to Delete Outlook's Default Folders

Check Contacts before moving them to Hotmail ...

Last reviewed on Apr 23, 2012