You may want to access older emails, but finding them isn't always easy. When Outlook only shows a few weeks of emails, the AutoArchive feature needs adjusting. Seeing these older emails in your folders makes referencing them faster, which is convenient in a work environment. Changing the settings for AutoArchive isn't difficult and only requires a few changes to change the view from a few weeks to months or a year.
Step 1
Open Outlook and click "Tools" in the toolbar. Select "Options" from the menu.
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Step 2
Choose the "Other" tab and click the "AutoArchive" button, located under "General." This brings up the AutoArchive settings to make your changes.
Step 3
Deselect "Run AutoArchive every __ days" if you don't want to archive your messages and want to view every message ever sent. If you receive several messages, this takes up a large amount of memory. All of the other options gray out and can't be changed if you select this option.
Step 4
Checking the box for "Run AutoArchive every ___ days" allows you to make changes to the settings, allowing you to view more than three weeks of emails.
Step 5
Select the check box for "Archive or delete old items" under the "During AutoArchive" heading. Click "Show archive folder in folder list."
Step 6
Under the "Default folder settings for archive" heading, check "Clean out items older than ___" and select either months, weeks or days from the drop-down menu. This moves messages older than the selected time into the archive folder.
Step 7
Decide whether you want to delete the messages or choose the folder in which to archive the older messages. Click "OK" to confirm the "AutoArchive" menu and then "OK" to confirm your selections in the "Options" menu.
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