Running Message Trace in Exchange Admin Center

In this tutorial, you will learn how to run a message trace using Exchange Admin Center to track any messages that was not delivered correctly or simply getting the status of the message sent or supposed to be received by the user(s).

Step 1. Log in to Exchange Admin Center for Exchange Online.

1. On your browser, login to Microsoft 365 Admin Portal via https://admin.microsoft.com
2. On the Sign in page, enter your Global Admin username in an email format and then enter your password on the Enter password page. Select Sign in.
3. On the Stay signed in? window, select the Don’t show this again check box and then select Yes.
4. From the Microsoft 365 Admin center page, go to the left-hand navigation pane and click Show all.

5. On the left-hand navigation pane, scroll down to Admin centers and select Exchange. This opens the new Exchange admin center for Exchange Online.

Note: For this tutorial, you will use the new Exchange admin center. Message trace function from the Classic Exchange Admin center has been moved to the new Exchange Admin Center as of December 2021.

Step 2. Run the message trace.

1. From the Exchange Admin Center page, expand Mail Flow and select Message trace.

2. On the Message trace page, under Default queries tab, click Start a trace. New message trace window will pop up on the right panel.

3. On the same window, choose the Report type you would want to get and click Search.

• Summary report – A summary report is available in near real-time, viewable immediate after you select Search. It provides message summary information, including date, sender, recipient, subject, and status. You can filter and export the results and get additional details about each message returned (such as diagnostic information, message events, related records and more).
• Enhanced summary report – An enhanced summary report is available only as downloadable CSV file. It includes the same information as the summary report, along with additional details such as direction, original client IP address, and more.
• Extended report – An extended report is available only as downloadable CSV file. It includes the same information as the summary and enhanced summary reports. Along with comprehensive routing and message event details.