Reducing the size of your mailbox

There are a few ways that you can reduce the size of your mailbox and Mailbox Archive to give you more space.

Empty Delete Items folder

The deleted items folder is a great backup for when you delete something and then maybe regret that decision.

But emails in there still take up space so you need to delete the emails from that folder to actually save space.

You have two options:

  1. Quick an easy, In Outlook, right-click and select Empty Folder. This will delete all you emails in that mailbox. We recommend this for your Archive mailbox Deleted items.

  2. Delete some emails. Select a date and then hold the shift key and go to the very bottom and click the last email. This will select all emails from the date you selected to the oldest. Now you can delete and will still leave a few newer ones in your inbox

Do a cleanup on your inbox and folders

More time consuming but just as important is to make sure that you are not holding onto emails that you no longer need to keep.

Have you finished a project? Delete the folder. Have to changed departments? Delete the emails from the old job.

(Don’t forget to delete the emails from deleted items when you are done)

Delete Email attachments or large emails

Sometimes, you can have a conversation with someone and each of you have included the same attachment. If the attachment is 1mb and you have each replied back 2 times, you now have used up 4mb with the same attachment.

Order your emails by size and this will show you the largest emails. Review the emails and delete the older ones that might have duplicate information. Or remove emails that are large and no longer relevant. You can save lots of space this way

Also, you can save the attachments separately from the email. Then delete the attachment in the email to save space.

(Don’t forget to delete the emails from deleted items when you are done)

Delete Sent items emails you do not need to keep.

Many people forget that every email you send is in your sent items. Have you have a long conversation back and forth. You might only need to keep the last email you sent.

Order your email by subject and delete the older ones.

(Don’t forget to delete the emails from deleted items when you are done)

Delete “Junk mail” and junk mail.

Obviously items in the Junk Mail folder can be cleared out too, but what about those emails you get from CNN or Bestbuy that you read and forgot about?

Order you emails by receiver and you can sometimes find hundreds of emails that you can delete all at once because you no longer need to keep them.

(Don’t forget to delete the emails from deleted items when you are done)

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