SharePoint Newsletter: How to Create, Write, and Send One in 2026

Quick answer: how to create a SharePoint newsletter. From a SharePoint Communication Site: add the organization as Visitors, create a News Post using a "Made for Email" template, fill in the blocks, then click "Post and Send" and add your recipients. For a multi-topic roundup, use "Email a news digest" to group several News Posts into one email.

What SharePoint can do natively

SharePoint was not originally designed as a dedicated newsletter platform. It is first an intranet and content-publishing layer, but Microsoft has progressively added native email-send capabilities for news, no Mailchimp, no external tool required. Two formats are available.

News Post (single announcement): create an article in SharePoint, choose a "Made for Email" template, customize text and visuals, and click "Post and Send." The article publishes to your intranet and lands in recipients' inboxes in one action.

News Digest (multiple articles): select several existing News Posts, arrange them in order, add a subject line and recipients, and send. Recipients get a single email with all selected articles under one layout.

How to create a SharePoint newsletter: 5 steps

Here is how to send your first SharePoint newsletter from start to finish.

1. Use a Communication Site. Team Sites are private by nature. For company-wide internal communication, you need a Communication Site. This is the foundation everything else depends on.
2. Set the right permissions. Invite the entire organization as Visitors to your Communication Site so everyone can access and receive your news.
3. Create a News Post with a "Made for Email" template. From the News web part, click "Add" then "News Post." Choose a template from the "Made for Email" section: these are pre-optimized for email rendering and limit web parts to those that display correctly in email clients. Fill in your title, text, and image.
4. Customize the content. Work within the blocks the template provides. The structure is intentional: it ensures your newsletter renders properly across Outlook and other clients.
5. Click "Post and Send." SharePoint publishes the article to your intranet and opens a send window. Add recipients (individual addresses or distribution lists), write a brief introduction, and send. Employees receive the newsletter embedded directly in their inbox.

SharePoint News Digest: group multiple articles in one email

The News Digest lets you group several articles into a single send. It works well for weekly roundups or monthly recaps.

One prerequisite: you need more published News Posts than the number your News web part is set to display. If the web part shows five and you only have five, the "See all" link does not appear, and that is how you reach the News Digest function. From "See all" below your News web part, click "Email a news digest," select the articles, drag them into order, name your digest, add recipients and a short description, then send. Worth noting: the News Digest creates a page in your Site Pages library. You can resend it later, but you cannot edit it. If you need a different version, create a new one.

Editorial best practices: what makes a newsletter actually get read

The technical setup is straightforward. What separates a newsletter people open from one that goes straight to the archive is the content.

• Write a subject line that earns the click. "Weekly updates" does not compel anyone. "What changes on July 15 (and what you need to do before then)" does. It is the first and most important decision, and it lives in the send window.
• Get to the point immediately. Microsoft's Work Trend Index 2025 reports employees are interrupted roughly every two minutes. A newsletter that warms up for two paragraphs loses readers before the point. State the main message in the first two sentences.
• Match format to content volume. One strong message deserves a single News Post. Five updates deserve a News Digest. Cramming multiple topics into one article dilutes each and makes the newsletter harder to skim.
• Use real visuals. SharePoint handles image storage and cropping automatically. Actual team photos, event images, or product visuals land more credibly than stock photography.
• Choose a frequency and stick to it. Monthly, fortnightly, weekly: cadence matters less than consistency. A newsletter that disappears for two months and reappears without explanation never builds a reading habit. This consistency is also what drives employee engagement over time.

The real limits of native SharePoint newsletters

The two native formats handle the basics. For professional internal communications, several gaps appear quickly:

• No engagement data. SharePoint does not tell you how many people opened your email, clicked a link, or read the article. Without data, you cannot improve what is not working.
• Fixed design. The "Made for Email" templates offer a handful of layouts. You cannot apply brand guidelines precisely, add a custom logo header, or build a consistent visual identity.
• Basic targeting. You can add distribution lists, but there is no simple, visual way to filter by department, location, or role from your Microsoft 365 directory.
• No scheduling. Every newsletter sends immediately. You cannot queue a message for Monday morning or test two subject lines first.
• No reusable branded templates. Each newsletter starts from a standard layout. Your communications team rebuilds the structure every time.

Going further with Jint Newsletter Studio

Jint Newsletter Studio is a native Microsoft 365 extension that turns SharePoint into a professional internal communications tool, part of the same digital workplace and built on the same Microsoft 365 intranet you already run, reinforcing your broader SharePoint intranet communication. It addresses each native gap without taking your team outside the Microsoft environment:

• A drag-and-drop editor. Build newsletters in a visual studio, pull existing SharePoint news directly, apply your brand guidelines. What you design is what employees see.
• Precise audience targeting from your M365 directory. Segment by department, role, location, or custom group, so employees stop receiving content that does not apply to them.
• Full engagement analytics. Open rates, click-through rates, engagement by segment. Optimize on real data, not assumptions.
• Scheduling and A/B testing. Queue sends, test two subject lines, analyze results.
• Security and compliance. All data stays inside your Microsoft 365 tenant. No third-party service, no new compliance perimeter. Jint is ISO 27001 certified and a certified Microsoft partner.

Jint clients often see higher open rates after moving to Newsletter Studio, mainly because they can target audiences and test subject lines instead of sending the same message to everyone, turning the newsletter into a real employee experience lever. Book a demo to see it inside your tenant.