How to back up and export folders in outlook for Mac

October 20, 2023 12:08 AM

I will soon be leaving my job (yay!) Before they close my email account, I want to make sure that I take my emails with me. It is about 10 years worth of emails. I am using outlook for Mac, and I have access to office 365 online. Try as I might, I could not find instructions how to transfer all my emails to a backup hard disk.

When I ask the IT department for help they send me a link to a procedure that looks nothing like the commands I have available, perhaps these export options are available on PC , but when I looked at Outlook on my partners windows computer, I could not see them either. Is there any way to download all my emails to the hard disk, so they will be available after my account is shut down? Thank you!
Here is the link from IT which does not help: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/export-emails-contacts-and-calendar-items-to-outlook-using-a-pst-file-14252b52-3075-4e9b-be4e-ff9ef1068f91

posted by slimeline to Computers & Internet (5 answers total)

Best answer: This any better? https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/export-items-to-an-archive-file-in-outlook-for-mac-281a62bf-cc42-46b1-9ad5-6bda80ca3106
posted by flabdablet at 2:34 AM on October 20, 2023

Your email is on your employer's server, and they probably own it. So Outlook/ MSoft doesn't make it easy to move email. Try flabdablet's link; they are usually right about technology. Test the archive before you leave your job. But here's another link, anyway.
corbettsoftware.com/blog/transfer-outlook-emails-to-another-account/
posted by theora55 at 4:14 PM on October 20, 2023

If you have a Windows computer available to you, get the free Mailstore Home edition. It will extract from many mail platforms; creating a local database. It has pretty good local search of that database, and you can "restore" the email to an email package different from the one you extracted the mail from. I used it to retrieve all of my Outlook mail, switch to Thunderbird, and then switch back to Outlook (long story). It will also do .mbox files, although my attempt with someone's Eudora didn't work out so well - still investigating why. In any event, it's a great tool for backing up email
posted by TimHare at 10:41 PM on October 20, 2023

Response by poster: Thank you for your help. In case anyone else has the same problem, know that export options are not available on 'New Outlook'. First you need to switch back to the Classic (under help menu), then export becomes available.
posted by slimeline at 9:45 AM on October 21, 2023 [2 favorites]

Thanks for the followup.
posted by theora55 at 5:38 PM on October 23, 2023