Mail verison 16.0 is putting my hotmail email account offline; won't authenticate password

The usual solution is to remove the problematic email account(s), and add them again.

Refer to If you can’t send or receive email on your Mac - Apple Support. You already addressed "Test using webmail" so proceed with "Remove your email account, then add it back."

• First remove: Remove your email account
• Then add: Add your email account

The dialog alleging the password is not correct or cannot be verified is not helpful, but it is essentially all that Mail can determine — a failure to authenticate. Remove the account and add it again. Just be sure to heed the Important note in that Apple Support document.

Having said all that, it is possible the Microsoft Exchange server hosting that Hotmail account will require a newer Mail version than the one incorporated with your macOS version. That would require updating macOS to Sonoma.

This does not help. The same message is received and I am running Sonoma 14.5. I have removed the account and now the same issue presents itself when I try to add it back in. I have selected account type of @, and I tried Microsoft Exchange, neither one of them will authenticate the @hotmail account.

Does not work to me either.... Removed and added several times, changed smtp server config, changed pw several times. Anyone with a solution for this? I like Mac´s Mail but wonder if I will need to switch to Outlook. I need to handle all my different email accounts in one same place. Prefer to stay with Mail if possible