What You Should Know About Outlook Deleted Items Folder
What many people don’t realize is that deleting an email in Outlook doesn’t remove that email for good. When you delete a message, this actually moves it to a Deleted Items folder.
The reason for this is that it gives you an opportunity to recover deleted emails in Outlook that you may delete by mistake. While this can be helpful, those messages in the Deleted Items folder still consume storage space in your Outlook mailbox.
If you want to permanently delete Outlook emails, you must either delete the messages and then empty the Deleted Items folder or take a different step to remove the emails immediately and skip that folder.
While you’ll learn how to delete emails in Outlook completely, you’ll also see how to both automatically and manually remove them, individually or in bulk, using Clean Email. These other methods give you more flexibility over the emails you want to remove as well as a clean Outlook inbox.
How to Permanently Delete Outlook Emails
Whether you use the application on your desktop or on the web, we’ll show you how to empty the Deleted Items folder in Outlook to permanently remove emails. We’ll also explain how to delete an email immediately to avoid that folder as well as automatically remove emails with your Outlook.com account in Clean Email.
How to Permanently Delete Emails From Outlook on Desktop
In the desktop application, you can permanently delete emails in Outlook in a few different ways.
Method One: To quickly empty the folder, right-click Deleted Items in the menu on the left. Select Empty Folder and click Yes to confirm.
Method Two: If you already have the Deleted Items folder open, you can go to the Folder tab and select Empty Folder in the Clean Up section of the ribbon.
Method Three: One more way to empty the Deleted Items folder is on the main Outlook screen with these steps:
- Open Outlook and select the File tab.
- Choose Info on the top left and pick Tools on the right.
- Select Empty Deleted Items Folder.
- Click Yes to confirm.
To permanently delete an email without sending it to the Deleted Items folder down the road, select the message (or several messages) and press Shift + Delete. Then, confirm by picking Yes in the pop-up window.
How to Permanently Delete Emails From Outlook on the Web
If you prefer to use Outlook on the web, you can permanently delete emails on Outlook.com just as easily.
Method One: To quickly empty the Deleted Items folder, follow these steps:
- Visit https://outlook.live.com/mail/ and sign in with your Microsoft account.
- Expand Folders in the left-hand menu and choose the Deleted Items folder.
- Right-click and select Empty folder.
- Confirm by clicking Delete All in the pop-up window.
Method Two: If you already have the Deleted Items folder open, you can also do the following to empty it:
- Pick Select on the top right of the folder.
- Check the box to the left of the Deleted Items label to select all messages.
- When you see the folder options appear at the bottom, choose Empty folder.
- Confirm by clicking OK in the pop-up window.
To permanently delete an email without sending it to the Deleted Items folder, you can use the same shortcut as in the desktop version. Choose the message (or mark several messages), press Shift + Delete, and confirm with OK.
How to Permanently Delete an Email in Outlook Using Clean Email
For a simple way to permanently as well as automatically delete emails in Outlook, you can use your Outlook.com account with Clean Email. Using Cleaning Suggestions and Auto Clean, you can save time by deleting emails in bulk and creating a rule to automatically remove those messages moving forward. Let’s take a look!
Remove Emails with Cleaning Suggestions
Clean Email’s Suggestions provide you with recommended cleanup options which include sending emails to the Trash. What’s nice about this feature is that you can move these messages as a group without having to select them individually.
- Select Suggestions in the Tools section of the side panel.
- You’ll then see messages grouped by sender or another factor, making it easy to remove several at once. To the right of an email group, select Trash to move all messages in that group.
- When you’re ready to empty the Trash folder, select Trash in the Mailbox section of the side panel.
- Pick Select and then Select All at the top.
- Choose Delete at the bottom and then Confirm.
💡 Hint: This method is similar to sending your emails to the Deleted Items folder in Outlook, and gives you the option to recover the messages. However, here’s how to bypass the step with the Trash folder in Clean Email: use the arrow next to the Trash button on the right and pick Delete. Then, confirm you are aware that choosing Delete is irreversible, and enjoy achieving Inbox Zero.
📌 Tip: If you use the Outlook mobile app, you can use Clean Email on Android and iPhone as well. This lets you enjoy the same email management features for tidying up your mailbox on the go.
Remove Emails Automatically with Auto Clean
With Auto Clean in Clean Email, you can create an Outlook rule to permanently delete emails or send them to the Trash in case you want to recover them. This reduces manual intervention moving forward.
When you see an email from a sender in the Cleaning Suggestions (above) that you want to automatically delete as more arrive, you can create the rule easily:
- Use the arrow next to the Trash button on the right to pick Create Rule.
- You’ll see the New Rule window prefilled with the sender of the email.
- For the action, pick either Delete to permanently remove it or Trash if you want the ability to recover it later.
- Optionally, you can apply the rule to other messages in your inbox by turning on the toggle.
- Choose Create Rule and you’re set.
Any new messages you receive from that sender will automatically go to the Trash or be deleted per your choice, saving you a ton of time.
📌 Tip: You can also create an Auto Clean rule to keep only the newest message in a message group (Keep Newest), move emails to other folders like Read Later or flag emails for follow-up.
Elevate Your Outlook Mailbox with Clean Email
Along with Clean Email’s Suggestions and Auto Clean features, you can take advantage of additional tools to keep your Outlook inbox tidy including Unsubscriber and Smart Folders.
With Unsubscriber, you can stop receiving newsletters and promotional emails that you end up deleting anyway. This saves you time from permanently removing these emails later because you’ll no longer receive them at all.
With Smart Folders, you can remove filtered emails in one fell swoop. Clean Email places messages into Smart Folders like Seasonal Sales, Online Shopping, and Newspapers and Magazines for you. You can then open the folder and delete multiple emails in Outlook you no longer need in bulk.
Remember, you can use these same features in the Clean Email mobile app along with Screener and Privacy Monitor. So, not only can you effortlessly manage your mailbox, but feel safe with Clean Email’s advanced security features.
Wrap-Up
There’s no reason to let the Deleted Items folder use so much of your mailbox storage. If you permanently delete old emails in Outlook or those you simply don’t need, you can regain some space and enjoy a cleaner mailbox.
When you add Clean Email to your Outlook account, you can take your inbox management to a whole new level while taking advantage of automations, flexibility, and a secure mailbox.
FAQs
How do you permanently delete emails in Outlook?
To permanently delete emails, you can empty the Outlook Deleted Items folder or press Shift + Delete on the selected email(s) and confirm the deletion.
How to delete multiple emails in Outlook permanently?
For deleting multiple emails from Outlook, use the Clean Email app to group messages by sender or other criteria and permanently delete them in bulk. Additionally, you can set Auto Clean rules for the automatic deletion of future messages from specific senders.
