Exchange recipient types

Exchange includes several explicit recipient types. Each recipient type is identified in
the Exchange admin center (EAC) and has a unique value in
the RecipientTypeDetails property in the Exchange Management Shell. The use of
explicit recipient types has the following benefits:

 At a glance, you can differentiate between various recipient types.

 You can search and sort by each recipient type.
 You can more easily perform bulk management operations for selected
recipient types.
 You can more easily view recipient properties because the EAC uses the
recipient types to render different property pages. For example, the resource
capacity is displayed for a room mailbox, but isn't present for a user mailbox.

The following table lists the available recipient types. All these recipient types are
discussed in more detail later in this topic.

TA
Recipient type Description
Dynamic A distribution group that uses recipient filters and conditions to derive its membership at th
distribution group messages are sent.
Equipment A resource mailbox that's assigned to a resource that's not location-specific, such as a porta
mailbox computer, projector, microphone, or a company car. Equipment mailboxes can be included
resources in meeting requests, providing a simple and efficient way of using resources for
users.
Linked mailbox A mailbox that's assigned to an individual user in a separate, trusted forest.
Mail contact A mail-enabled Active Directory contact that contains information about people or organiz
that exist outside the Exchange organization. Each mail contact has an external email addre
messages sent to the mail contact are routed to this external email address.
Mail forest A mail contact that represents a recipient object from another forest. Mail forest contacts a
contact typically created by Microsoft Identity Integration Server (MIIS) synchronization.
Note: Mail forest contacts are read-only recipient objects that are updated only through MI
similar custom synchronization. You can't use the EAC or the Exchange Management Shel
remove or modify a mail forest contact.
Mail user A mail-enabled Active Directory user that represents a user outside the Exchange organiza
Each mail user has an external email address. All messages sent to the mail user are routed
external email address.
A mail user is similar to a mail contact, except that a mail user has Active Directory logon
credentials and can access resources.
Mail-enabled A mail-enabled Active Directory global or local group object. Mail-enabled non-universal
non-universal were discontinued in Exchange Server 2007 and can exist only if they were migrated from
group Exchange 2003 or earlier versions of Exchange. You can't use Exchange Server 2013 to cr
universal distribution groups.
 TA
Recipient type Description
Mail-enabled An Exchange public folder that's configured to receive messages.
public folder
Distribution A distribution group is a mail-enabled Active Directory distribution group object that can b
groups only to distribute messages to a group of recipients.
Mail-enabled A mail-enabled security group is an Active Directory universal security group object that c
security group used to assign access permissions to resources in Active Directory and can also be used to
messages.
Microsoft A special recipient object that provides a unified and well-known message sender that diffe
Exchange system-generated messages from other messages. It replaces the System Administrator sen
recipient for system-generated messages in earlier versions of Exchange.
Room mailbox A resource mailbox that's assigned to a meeting location, such as a conference room, audit
training room. Room mailboxes can be included as resources in meeting requests, providin
simple and efficient way of organizing meetings for your users.
Shared mailbox A mailbox that's not primarily associated with a single user and is generally configured to
access for multiple users.
Site mailbox A mailbox comprised of an Exchange mailbox to store email messages and a SharePoint si
store documents. Users can access both email messages and documents using the same clie
interface. For more information, see Site mailboxes.
User mailbox A mailbox that's assigned to an individual user in your Exchange organization. It typically
messages, calendar items, contacts, tasks, documents, and other important business data.
Office 365 In hybrid deployments, an Office 365 mailbox consists of a mail user that exists in Active
mailbox on-premises and an associated cloud mailbox that exists in Exchange Online.
Linked user A linked user is a user whose mailbox resides in a different forest than the forest in which
resides.