For many people that use Outlook as their email program, it’s very frustrating when you get an email that’s supposed to have pictures in it, but Outlook doesn’t display those pictures – it only shows a red “X”.

And in all of Microsoft’s wisdom, they didn’t create a clear or intuitive way to fix this problem. But here’s how you do it.

(Note: the instructions and screenshots here are for Outlook 2016, but they are very similar for Outlook 2013 or 2010. If you are using an older version than that, you really need to upgrade anyway.)

In Outlook, click on File, then Options.

In the new window, click on Trust Center:

Then click on Trust Center Settings:

Now go to the “Automatic Download” section and UNcheck the box that says “Don’t download pictures automatically in HTML email”

Then click OK in the two open windows, and you’re back in Outlook. You might need to restart Outlook in order for this to take effect. And, this change may only apply to new emails that come in from now on, not the emails that are already downloaded. But that should solve the “Red X” problem in Outlook.