What Does Tentative Mean in Outlook? A Maybe, on Invites and Calendars

Tentative in a meeting invite means maybe, in Outlook and in Teams. When you answer a meeting invite with Tentative, you tell the organizer you might attend, and the meeting stays on your calendar marked as tentatively booked. As a calendar status, Tentative sits between Free and Busy: people checking your schedule see a striped block, so they know you might be taken, but it does not block the time the way Busy does. Tentative does not change your status dot in Outlook or Teams; only a Busy event turns you red, In a meeting.

The same word appears in Microsoft Teams, which uses your Outlook calendar, with the same meaning. If your calendar also drives a Slack status, see Slack Outlook Calendar integration.

Where you see Tentative in Outlook

Tentative as a reply to a meeting invite

In an invite, pick Tentative from the response buttons. Outlook asks whether to send the response now, edit it with a note, or not send a response. The meeting stays on your calendar, marked Tentative, and the organizer's tracking list counts you as a maybe. From the Tentative button you can also pick Propose new time, which sends the organizer a different slot while keeping your maybe.

Organizers read it as "planning to come if nothing better lands". If you know you will attend, Accept is clearer; if you know you will not, Decline frees the organizer to plan without you. Teams calendar invites have the same three options, with RSVP labels Accept, Tentative and Decline.

Why unanswered invites show as Tentative

When an invite arrives, Exchange puts it on your calendar right away as Tentative, so the time does not look free while you decide. This is why a meeting you never answered still shows up, striped, in your day. It is controlled by the mailbox setting AddNewRequestsTentatively, which is on by default. An Exchange admin can check it in Exchange Online PowerShell:

Get-CalendarProcessing -Identity alex@contoso.com | Format-List AddNewRequestsTentatively

When you answer, the entry changes to Busy (Accept), stays Tentative, or disappears (Decline).

Tentative vs Busy

Outlook's other Show as values are Free, Working elsewhere and Out of office; what each does to your status dot is in Outlook status colors meaning.

How to change a Tentative meeting to Accepted

• Open the meeting on your calendar.
• Select Accept, or Respond > Accept in newer Outlook versions.
• Choose whether to send the response. The bar turns solid, and Teams shows you In a meeting when it starts.

To mark your own event Tentative, open it and set Show as to Tentative. Outlook on the web and the new Outlook for Windows put Show as in the event's toolbar or its ... menu.