How to Archive Microsoft Outlook Email

These days, our email accounts tend to be overrun – full of things we do not want or need. Inboxes can quickly clog up, causing a headache when trying to find something that is actually important. I mostly use my Gmail account these days, but still have a use for my Outlook account and program. One of my older – and main – email addresses is tied to it, with a ton of business connections thrown in. However, since the email account is so old, you can imagine the sheer amount of junk I tend to get there.

It was not that long ago that I stared at my Inbox in horror and threw my hands up in the air. I decided it was time – *gulp* – to clean up my Outlook Inbox by archiving some of the chaos.

Archiving email folders in Outlook is pretty simple. I hope you enjoy this tutorial on how it’s done.

How to Manually Archive Emails in Outlook

In order to keep your inbox from filling up, you can quickly move the old and unwanted to an archive. This is a completely separate Data File within Outlook. You can then access it again from within the email program any time you choose.

If you are using Microsoft Outlook 2013 still, you will need to click “File”, followed by “Info” and then Cleanup Tools”. Lastly, choose “Archive”.

For those of you rocking Outlook 2016 or 2019, click “File”, then “Info”, followed by “Tools” and lastly choose “Clean up Old Items”.

In the box that pops up, click on “Archive this Folder and All Subfolders” and then choose the folder you’re ready to not have to see for awhile. After that, find where it says “Archive Items Older Than” and enter a date.

At the bottom of the box, click on ”OK” and presto! Those pesky full folders that you do not want to deal with are now empty!

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How to Turn on Automatic Outlook Email Archiving

With automatic archiving, you get to decide how often the Archive tool will run itself, where you want the files to be stored and even how long your beloved email program will keep emails before archiving them for you. Here is what you need to do to turn this feature on and set it up:

Click “File” then “Options” and then “Advanced”.

Scroll down to “AutoArchive” and select “AutoArchive Settings”.

Check on the box that says “Run AutoArchive Every n Days” box, then choose how often you want this tool to run.

Go through each of the other options, and choose the ones you want, including having the emails deleted completely instead of sending them to an archive folder to languish forever.

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How to Turn Off Automatic Archiving in Outlook

Decided you no longer want Outlook to archive certain folders automatically? Need the control back to choose when and how to do it yourself? Easy peasy! Just turn AutoArchiving back off:

Select the “File” button once more, choose “Options”, then “Advanced”. Find “AutoArchive” and select the Settings button again.

Uncheck the box that says “Run AutoArchive Every n Days” box, and you’re all set!

 

Do you have any other Outlook questions I can help you with? Leave me a comment or send us an email, and I will do my best to help.

Happy Emailing!