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How to Assign an Outlook Category to all HebCal events (to add desirred color to events)?
How can I assign a Category in Outlook 2019 to all HebCal events? This would allow me to to specify a desired color to the HebCal events on the Outlook calendar.
Answer
Unfortunately, Outlook 2019 does not respect or import the CATEGORIES property from iCalendar/ICS feeds.
When Outlook 2019 imports or subscribes to an ICS feed, it essentially ignores the RFC 2445 CATEGORIES field entirely. It does not map those values to Outlook's own Categories system. This is a long-standing limitation — Outlook's category system is proprietary and not wired up to the standard iCalendar CATEGORIES property on import.
So even though Hebcal is doing the right thing by tagging each event with a proper RFC 2445 CATEGORIES value like HOLIDAY or PARSHA, Outlook just drops that metadata on the floor.
Recommended workarounds to get separate colors:
1. Use Outlook on the Web or Microsoft 365 — newer versions have better category support for synced calendars. Outlook's category system requires that category names in the ICS file match pre-existing entries in your Master Category List (MCL). So even if OWA reads the CATEGORIES field from Hebcal's ICS (e.g., HOLIDAY or PARSHA), those values won't map to colored categories unless you have identically named entries already set up in your Outlook category list. If there's no match, the categories are silently dropped.
2. Use separate calendar feeds, each with their own color. For example If you’d like to include the Hebrew date for every day of the year, you can subscribe to that calendar via a separate calendar feed at our Jewish Holiday downloads page. Look for Hebrew calendar dates (English) or Hebrew calendar dates (Hebrew).
Customer support service by UserEcho
Unfortunately, Outlook 2019 does not respect or import the
CATEGORIESproperty from iCalendar/ICS feeds.When Outlook 2019 imports or subscribes to an ICS feed, it essentially ignores the RFC 2445
CATEGORIESfield entirely. It does not map those values to Outlook's own Categories system. This is a long-standing limitation — Outlook's category system is proprietary and not wired up to the standard iCalendarCATEGORIESproperty on import.So even though Hebcal is doing the right thing by tagging each event with a proper RFC 2445
CATEGORIESvalue likeHOLIDAYorPARSHA, Outlook just drops that metadata on the floor.Recommended workarounds to get separate colors:
1. Use Outlook on the Web or Microsoft 365 — newer versions have better category support for synced calendars. Outlook's category system requires that category names in the ICS file match pre-existing entries in your Master Category List (MCL). So even if OWA reads the
CATEGORIESfield from Hebcal's ICS (e.g.,HOLIDAYorPARSHA), those values won't map to colored categories unless you have identically named entries already set up in your Outlook category list. If there's no match, the categories are silently dropped.2. Use separate calendar feeds, each with their own color. For example If you’d like to include the Hebrew date for every day of the year, you can subscribe to that calendar via a separate calendar feed at our Jewish Holiday downloads page. Look for Hebrew calendar dates (English) or Hebrew calendar dates (Hebrew).