Outlook manual backup

Restoring this data in case of loss might take much time especially when you have multiple accounts. This article describes several ways to backup Outlook account settings in great detail. You will also gain answers to popular questions like:. The legend has it that early versions of Outlook contained special functionality that enabled you to backup your account settings.

Probably, the developers considered it redundant. Neither do we. Some might find this particular backup process excessive. However, things are different for large organizations such as enterprises, governmental institutions, or educational facilities.

These have dozens or even hundreds of outlook accounts. Restoring their unique configurations might cause significant downtime. Here's how:. Exchange accounts keep all data on the server, and your computer stores the Offline Outlook Data File. As a rule, Exchange accounts archive data automatically, and backing up emails is the task of your administrator.

Alternatively, you can export your emails to a. The most reliable and safe way to restore Outlook backup is to let the built-in Import and Export wizard walk you through the process. Under Options , choose how you want to deal with duplicated items, and click Next. In most cases, it makes sense to go with the default Replace duplicates with items imported. If your Outlook backup is password protected, enter the password, and click OK.

In case you have two or more Outlook accounts, select Import items into the same folder in , open the drop-down list, choose the account where you want to import the backup, and click Finish. If you have just one account, you can leave the default selection, whichever it is. If you want to restore the contents of one specific folder, say Inbox , expand the folders hierarchy under Select the folder to import from , and choose the desired folder.

To import all subfolders of the selected folder, make sure the Include subfolders checkbox is selected: Clicking the Finish button will start importing the contents of your. This will start the Import wizard, and you follow the above steps to do importing. As you have just seen, importing a. If you need to backup Outlook emails on a regular basis, you can save time using the following way to restore the backup.

So, if you want to keep both the current and backed-up data, import the. Importing will merge the current data and backup data in a single.

If you have just created a new Outlook account which automatically creates a new empty. Otherwise, it might be reasonable to test the backup first. Knowing that the current. Start Outlook, test the restored. Tips and notes:. If you have not created an account yet, you can connect your pst backup to a new account during the setup process.

When this option is selected, Outlook automatically moves old emails and other items to the archive. By default, Outlook stores the archive. To choose another location or give another name to the archived. Permanently delete items.

This will delete old items permanently as soon as they reach the end of the aging period, no archive copy will be created. Apply these settings to all folders now. To apply the configured AutoArchive settings to all folders, click this button. If you want to apply other settings for one or more folders, do not click this button.

Instead, configure the archiving settings for each folder manually. Default aging periods used by Outlook Auto Archive The default aging periods in all Outlook versions are as follows:. The default periods can be changed for each folder individually using the Mailbox Cleanup option. To prevent Outlook Auto Archive from running on a certain folder, or set a different schedule and options for that folder, perform the following steps. Click OK to save the changes.

You can use this method to automatically delete old emails from the Deleted Items and Junk E-mail folders. The detailed steps are here. How to create archive folder in Outlook If you selected the Show archive folder in folder list option when configuring the Outlook Auto Archive settings , the Archives folder should appear in the Navigation pane automatically.

If the above option was not selected, you can display the Outlook Archive folder in this way:. That's it! The Archive folder will show up in the list of folders straight away:. Once the Archive folder is there, you can find and open your archived items as usual.

To search in Outlook archive, select the Archive folder in the Navigation Pane, and type your search text in the Instant Search box. To remove the Archive folder from your list of folders, right click on it, and then click Close Archive. Don't worry, this will only remove the Archives folder from the Navigation pane, but won't delete the actual archive file.

You will be able to restore your Outlook Archive folder any time you need it by performing the above steps. If you don't want any automatic archiving, you can archive emails and other items manually whenever you want. This way, you can have more control over which items to keep and which to move to the archive, where to store the archive file, and so on. Please keep in mind that unlike Outlook AutoArchive , manual archiving is a one-time process , and you will need to repeat the below steps each time you want to move older items to archive.

If you want to archive all emails, calendars , and tasks , select the root folder in your Outlook mailbox, i.

By default, in Outlook and later versions, the root folder is displayed as your email address I've renamed mine to Svetlana as shown in the screenshot below :. Finally, click OK, and Outlook will begin creating an archive immediately. As soon as the process is completed, the Archive folder will appear in your Outlook. As you already know, Outlook archive is a type of Outlook Data File.

The archive. The archive file location depends on the operating system installed on your computer. Unless you changed the default location when configuring the archive settings, you can find the archive file in one of the following places:. If you cannot find the archive. Here's a quick way to determine the exact location of your Outlook archive: right-click the Archive folder in the list of folders, and then click Open File Location.

This will immediately open the folder where your archived. If you have created a few different archive files, you can view all the locations at a glance in this way:. Here you need to use the Export feature of Outlook that will help you export the entire Outlook mailbox data into a new PST file.

In this way, you will get a backup copy of your PST file. Follow the steps given below:. Step 1: First, launch Microsoft Outlook on your computer. Step 2: The Import and Export Wizard will appear.

Here you need to choose Export to a file , and then click Next to continue the process. Click Next to continue the process. For example Inbox. You can also include the subfolders. Step 5: Now define a location where you want to save the Outlook backup file. Finally, click Finish to start the process. Within a couple of minutes, the process will be completed and you will get a new PST file containing all the mailbox data of your original PST file.

You can now use this PST file as an Outlook backup file. The emails and other data stored in the Outlook data file are no different from other data. You can forward, reply, or search through the stored mailbox data as you do with other Outlook data. This article has described how to take the backup of Outlook emails.