Managing Your Outlook 2010 Mailbox
Check the amount of space used by your e-mail in Outlook 2010, please follow the steps below.
Open Microsoft Outlook 2010 and right-click on your name displayed in the folders pane as shown below. Scroll down to “Data File Properties…” and click / select it.
The Outlook Today window will open (shown below). In that window, click the “Folder Size…” button (circled in red) to open the “Folder Size” window.
In the “Folder Size” window below, circled in red is the current size of your mailbox which includes all folders and messages and any attachments they may have. 65363 kilobytes converts roughly to 65 megabytes. This particular mailbox is about 65 megabytes in size.
Tips for minimizing the size of your mailbox.
To get rid of large files that may be taking up the majority of space used by your mailbox, open the “Search Folders” tree in your folders list as shown below and select “Large Mail”.
Once your “Large Mail” view is open, you will see messages grouped by Size categories (Enormous, Huge, Very Large and Large). Review and delete those you don't need any longer.
Sort your "Sent Items" folder by size by clicking on the “Size” column and remove large unneeded messages.
Look for mail items you may have in your "Junk E-mail" folder, review and delete unwanted messages.
Finding Large Messages
- Click on the “File” tab at the top left of Microsoft Outlook. Next, click on the “Cleanup Tools” button and select “Mailbox Cleanup…” from the dropdown menu.
- Select "Find items larger than" and then fill in a size. Press Find... and you'll see an Advanced Find window open and it will locate the messages. You can delete the messages you no longer need.
Finding Old Messages
- Repeat the steps above in 2e, but instead select "Find items older than" and then fill in the number of days. Press the "Find..." button. The Advanced Find window opens and it will locate the messages. You can delete the messages you no longer need.
Cleaning Out Your Trash
- Repeat the steps above in 2e, but instead click on the "View Deleted Items Size..." button to view items in your Deleted Items folder and/or press Empty to delete items from your Deleted Items folder. You can still retrieve them via Recover Deleted Items feature for 30 days.
Deleted Items folder should probably be emptied upon each exit from Outlook. This is set via: Tools; Options; Other... place a checkmark in the top box.
Manual Archive to Personal Folders
- Click on the File menu at the top left of exchange and choose “Cleanup Tools” and then select “Archive…” from the drop down list.
- Make sure that you select the top of your mailbox if you would like to archive the entire mailbox, otherwise, select which folders in your mailbox that you would like to archive. You may choose to archive files older than a specific date, and then click on the browse button.
- Save the archive file to your Documents folder. You may name the file whatever you like, but make sure you name it something that will remind you exactly what it is. (Note the file extension as a PST file. This is the file extension for Microsoft’s “Personal Store File”, which is used to archive e-mail.
- Click “Ok”, and then click “Ok” again on the Archive window to create the archive. The archive will show up below your existing folder list in Outlook in an “Archives” tree. You will be able to drag mail here that you would like to back up.
- Make sure you make a backup of your archived .PST file onto a USB jump drive or Compact Disc regularly in case it is ever lost from your computer’s hard drive.
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