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Move Outlook Emails of Specific Date Range to a Folder

If you would like to move the Microsoft Outlook emails of specific date range to a specific folder, you may use the Outlook Rules feature to achieve it. You may either use the rule one time only or run this rule on a specific folder. Here is a simple tutorial in order to achieve it.

Go to Home > Rules > Manage Rules & Alerts

Microsoft Outlook File Manage Rules

It will open up Rules and Alerts dialog. Click on “New Rule…”

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard

It will open up Rules Wizard. Select “Apply rule on messages I receive” and click on “Next >” button to choose conditions.

Outlook Rules Wizard

Here you will select various conditions. These are the conditions if satisfied, it will choose a specific email to be acted upon. Select “received in a specific date span”. You may also choose other conditions like an email received from a specific people or group, specific word in subject/body or a specific account if you have multiple accounts. As soon as you select the condition, the conditions are added to the bottom. click on the individual links to choose the condition values. For example, clicking on “in a specific date span” would open up a window to select the date range. After selecting, click “Next >” button to choose actions to perform on emails matching the conditions

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Select Condition

Select “move it to a specified folder” action or any other action from the given list. Selected actions will be added at the bottom. Click on individual selected actions to specify values. Click “Next >” button to select exceptions

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Action

If you want to add exceptions to exclude certain emails, you may do so. Select the exception condition and choose the exception values. Click “Next >” to come to the final step.

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Exception

Give the name to the rule. If you want to apply this rule for every incoming email, choose “Turn on this rule”. If you want to run it only one time, unselect “Turn on this rule”. Click “Finish” button to complete the rule.

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Finish

If you want to run this rule on a specific folder,  go to Home > Rules > Manage Rules & Alerts > Run Rules Now…

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Run Rules

Select the rule to run, choose the folder to run the rule on and click on “Run Now” button

Outlook Rules and Alerts Wizard Run Rules Now

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33 responses to “Move Outlook Emails of Specific Date Range to a Folder”

  1. Tom Avatar
    Tom

    That is for a specific date not after so many days move to a folder.
    Example would be to move any email that are 28 days old automatically to a folder.

  2. Anuja Joshi Avatar
    Anuja Joshi

    how to make a rule to forward mails from my inbox to a particular e-mail id. but every time i run this rule, already forwarded mails should not get again forward.

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Anuja,

      You may forward it using two ways.

          Use mail server functionality/settings to forward any emails that you receive.
          Use mail client (i.e. Outlook to run rules on incoming emails). This rule must run only once on incoming email. If you run the rule multiple times, it will forward those emails again.

      Regards
      Vishal Monpara

  3. Brian Avatar
    Brian

    Such a simple thing I overlooked! Thank you!
    Was looking at all sorts of scripts to archive a users old email. Tried to over-complicate!

  4. baha Avatar
    baha

    super helpful. Thanks!

  5. JIW Avatar
    JIW

    This was super helpful. Thanks!

  6. Paul E Lecoq Avatar
    Paul E Lecoq

    absolutely useless. no way of accomplishing the first step with no toolstrip.
    These instructions always assume you know everything that isn’t in this particular page. Plus Microsoft is always switching things around, instead of just leaving them where they are easy to find. Don’t change things that don’t need changing then brag about the “new” feature. just about all the help pages is not helpful.

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hi Paul,

      Sometimes toolstrip/ribbon is hidden and only menu is shown. Once you click on menu, it shows the toolstrip/ribbon. Once that is visible, you should be able to follow the article along with screen shot.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  7. Shailesh Yadav Avatar
    Shailesh Yadav

    How to move mail of “sent items” for “particular date range” to other folder. I have tried the same way for “Apply rule on messages I send”.

    I haven’t seen any specific date range for it. Can we do the same things for sent item or not. If we can then how can we do this please guide.

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Shailesh,

      It seems like moving emails from specific date range is not possible on “Sent Items” because. Because the condition is for received email and “Sent Items” contains only sent emails.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  8. Ted Hurren Avatar
    Ted Hurren

    Hi,

    Is there a way to do this for sent emails rather than received?

    Look forward to hearing from you.

    Ted

  9. mab Avatar
    mab

    Rule has name 1 to 17 of March, but condition meets 2 to 16 of March only.

  10. Feriansyah Avatar
    Feriansyah

    Dear Mr. Vishal,

    Thank you for information , i have a question for you :
    – if i want to move automaticaly email before 01 November 2020 , what should i do ?

    Please give me advice.
    Thank you for your support.

    Regards,

    Feriansyah

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Feriansyah,

      I have not tested this. When you select date span, choose the date 01 Nov, 2020 for “Before” and don’t select anything for “After”. If “After” is required, choose a very old date.

      Thank you
      Vishal Monpara

  11. John Bowling Avatar
    John Bowling

    Thank you for the clear instructions.

  12. Amit Kumar Bansal Avatar
    Amit Kumar Bansal

    Seems great explanation 🙂 Keep the great work

  13. bing ting ling Avatar
    bing ting ling

    GREAT JOB AND TUTORIAL!

  14. Shobin Chawla Avatar
    Shobin Chawla

    Hi Vishal,

    The Rules section does not show an option to move mails sent in a specific time duration to a specified folder. Please suggest if there is any method for this. I want to move sent mails between 2016-2018 in a specified folder.

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Shobin,

      I am not aware of why Rule section does not show the needed option.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  15. Bob Smithe Avatar
    Bob Smithe

    Thanks for this post! I have my Outlook (ProPlus) cache set for 3 months of local storage and the rule I have set is to look 3 years back (i.e., that mail is not cached locally).

    I ran the run and it didn’t move any of the older email that was online storage in Exchange Online. Do you know if this rule will only work against email downloaded to the local cache?

    Thanks again!

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Bob,

      Based on my understanding, the rules run on Exchange (which should include Exchange Online) but I am not aware of why it would not run for you.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  16. Luke Avatar
    Luke

    Great answer!

  17. John Avatar
    John

    Can I set a rule where emails that are older than 90 days get automatically move to specific folder?

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hi John,

      I am not aware of any automated rule to move email to a specific folder. You may use Outlook Archive functionality but depending on your need, archiving may not work as similar to moving to a folder.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  18. Richard Martin Avatar
    Richard Martin

    I don’t know how old this post is, but your menu structure looks NOTHING like mine in Windows 10. There is no HOME tab, so none of the rest of it is accessible. I was hopeful. It is precisely the advice I needed, but seems to be impossible to duplicate on my machine!!

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Richard,

      If you have Outlook 2007 or older version, it has different menu structure. Outlook 2010, 2013 and 2016 has similar menu structure as shown on this post. If you are using Outlook 2007, “Rules and Alerts” is available under “Tools” menu. After you open up this wizard, you can follow the rest of the steps from this article.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  19. Raf Avatar
    Raf

    Thank you for this interessting method. Is it possible to also add a Time. ex. messages recieved today before 2pm?

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hi Raf,

      This is out-of-the-box functionality from Outlook so I don’t think it is possible.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

  20. Goran Avatar
    Goran

    HI Vishal,

    Can I create a rule that will move the attachment in a local folder and not in outlook folder?

    Thanks
    Goran

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hello Goran,

      I am not aware of any way to move attachment to a local folder

      Regards
      Vishal Monpara

  21. Kaalee Avatar
    Kaalee

    Hi,

    It worked fine in Outlook 2016. Thank you…

  22. Larry V Avatar
    Larry V

    Have you tested that this actually works? Because two of us tried it on Outlook 2016 and it did not move the messages when run manually. And since we are trying to move older messages we can’t rely on havint this rule run automatically

    1. Vishal Monpara Avatar
      Vishal Monpara

      Hi Larry,

      I had tested the steps with Outlook 2013 and it was working as expected. Based on what you said, I am ruling out the possibility that any other rules or “Stop processing further” setting might interfere. Without having Outlook 2016, it is difficult to recreate it on my side or suggest an alternative.

      Regards,
      Vishal Monpara

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