Same problem here, with diagnostic log evidence that may help the Outlook for Mac team.
Outlook for Mac 16.113 (26091433) forces Legacy Outlook on every launch; the New Outlook toggle does not persist
Environment: macOS 26.6.2 (25G83). Outlook auto-updated from 16.112.4 (26090911) to 16.113 (26091433) on 2026-09-18 around 09:27 EDT. Current Channel, no MDM or configuration profiles. Accounts: one school Exchange Online account, one Microsoft account, Google, and IMAP. License shows "Not Activated" — unchanged from 16.112.4, where New Outlook worked.
Repro: Launch Outlook 16.113 → it opens in Legacy Outlook showing only an old 2023 Legacy profile, "Outlook is Offline". Turn the Legacy Outlook toggle off → "Switch to Outlook" → the app relaunches into Legacy again. Reproducible on every launch (4 of 4).
Expected: New Outlook launches, as it did on 16.112.4 on 2026-09-16 with the same profile and license state.
Diagnostic log evidence (from ~/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.Outlook/Data/Library/Logs/Diagnostics/OUTLOOK):
16.112.4 (good):
PreviewCheck {"isPreview":true,"isRunningNewOutlook":true,"isPreviewGateOn":true,...}
Beta Feature Gate {"FeatureName":"Preview","Status":true,"Availability":true,"OverrideOn":true,"OverrideOff":false}
16.113 (bad):
PreviewCheck {"isPreview":false,"isRunningNewOutlook":true,"isPreviewGateOn":false,...}
Beta Feature Gate {"FeatureName":"Preview","Status":false,"Availability":true,"OverrideOn":true,"OverrideOff":false}
Accessing shared OutlookGating instance before it has been configured. Any queries will return NO. (9x per launch on 16.113; 0x on 16.112.4)
ErageAppDelegate: Set isRunningNewOutlook user default
It looks like the Preview / New Outlook gate is queried before OutlookGating is configured, returns NO, and the app falls back to Legacy and overwrites the user's New Outlook preference. The New Outlook data (HxStore) is still intact on disk, so accounts are not deleted — they are just not visible from Legacy.
If this is instead an intentional licensing change, the UI gives no indication of that — and users with paid perpetual licenses are reporting the same behavior, so it does not appear limited to unlicensed installs. Other reports since 2026-09-17: r/Outlook ("For Mac users, Outlook is not free anymore?", "Outlook app on MacOS doesn't work!") and several posts on X tagged @MSFT365Status.
Could someone from Microsoft confirm whether this is a known regression in 16.113 and whether a fixed build is planned?