How to Archive Emails in Outlook 2010

From time to time some of our co-employees are calling us up that their mailbox is already full, thus they are not receiving emails anymore. What we usually do is to archive their emails to free up some space on their mailbox so it can accommodate the incoming emails. Archiving is moving the emails from the mail server onto another folder or drive. You need to be sure that the new folder or drive is safe enough otherwise you might lose your important emails. It is a good idea to keep a backup of the archived emails just in case if something goes wrong with your computer you can retrieve it at anytime.

On the picture above my mailbox has not yet reached the full level but for the sake of demonstration I had to archive it.

Here's how to archive emails in Outlook 2010:

1. Click the "File" tab
2. Click the "Cleanup Tools"
3. Click "Archive..."
4. Click the "Archive this folder and all subfolders"
5. Specify the date on "Archive items older than". This will archive the emails starting from the date you specify here backward.
6. Under the "Archive File", you may change the default archive file name or leave it as it is. 
7. You may optionally save the archive file on another location or leave it as it is. You have to be sure that you have enough space on the drive you specified for the archive file.
8. You may optionally put a tick mark on "Include items with Do not AutoArchive checked" or leave it as it is. If you put a tick mark on this option it will include any items that might be individually marked to be excluded from automatic archiving.
9. Finally, click "Ok"

This process may take some time depending on the number of emails that you are archiving.

When you go back to your emails you will notice at the bottom the "Archive" you have just created wherein you will also see the folders created identical to that of your current email. If you want to see where your archive file is saved you may do so by going to the "Account settings" and clicking the "Data Files" tab.