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Duplicate items in Microsoft Outlook can clutter your inbox, hamper productivity and cause confusion. Keeping track of what’s new and what’s deleted can be challenging, especially when importing items into Outlook. To make matters worse, Outlook’s duplicate detection option is turned off by default during import, leading to missed duplicates.
But, removing duplicate items is not an impossible task. In fact, there are multiple ways to remove Outlook duplicate items quickly and efficiently, without the need for complex technical expertise. So, this post will provide you with a step-by-step guide on how to identify and remove duplicate items from your Outlook mailbox.
To help you remove duplicate items in Microsoft Outlook 2016, 2019 and in all previous versions, go through this entire post meticulously.
Microsoft Outlook is counted among the prominent applications offered with Microsoft Suite. For ensuring smooth performance, Outlook requires loads of resources. Outlook users commonly encounter duplication of messages and emails from time to time. You will probably be facing the below-mentioned problems at some point in time.
The reasons are many, and the possible reasons are listed below.
Whatever may be the reason behind creating multiple copies of a single message, it will hamper the productivity of Microsoft Outlook, and therefore, you should remove Outlook duplicates
You cannot determine the duplicity of a single outlook email in a single glance. You can use several properties of a message to check if it shows more than a single email. You can use the following fields for the comparison:
If you run a search using such fields, you can see the same emails multiple times if you have duplicates in the mailbox. For a small number of duplicate emails, you can search the inbox emails based on the above fields (e.g. “Subject”) and delete the similar emails using the Delete option in the application. But the same would be a tough task when there are a large number of duplicate items.
Cleaning the duplicated files from your mailbox is essential. It would be tough for you if you have hundreds to thousands of such items. If the count is even bigger, it would be almost impossible to delete those items manually. So, in short, removing duplicate items manually is not an easy task, and unfortunately, Microsoft does not provide an easy fix for this problem, not even in Outlook 2013.
Do you want to eliminate the duplicate emails from your Outlook?
Before you get ready to remove the duplicate items of Microsoft Outlook, you need to find the cause of the problem and then solve the problem. However, if you cannot do anything, then here is the help for you. Below mentioned are five ways to remove duplicate files from Outlook mailbox.
1) Configure the rules correctly
Check whether the Outlook rules are configured correctly or not. If rules are not set appropriately, it will create confusion among different email folders. Configure the rules correctly so that Outlook remove duplicate emails instantly. Also, ensure that only a single instance of the Outlook application is running. Close the extra instances of the Outlook.exe using the Task Manager on your system.
2) Always select “Do not Import Duplicate Items” while importing Outlook items
When you import of Outlook PST file items like mailbox folder or contacts using the Import/Export feature in the Outlook application, you must ensure to select the “Do Not Import Duplicate Items” option towards the end of the Import process to avoid the import of duplicate items in the application
3) Set the inbox updates frequency
Being one of the best ways for duplicate email remover for Outlook, you can easily update inbox frequency and get rid of the issue in seconds.
4) Clean up the inbox
Outlook has a number of utilities and add-ins, which can help you to clean-up the duplicate emails easily. Perform the below steps to clean up your mailbox & remove duplicate emails in Outlook
5) Antivirus application
If you are using Microsoft Outlook and you have duplicate items in your inbox, you may be able to resolve the issue by disabling your antivirus software. In some cases, the antivirus software can cause Outlook to display duplicate items.
Outlook delete duplicate emails when you disable your antivirus software, follow these steps for the same:
If you are still seeing duplicate items in your inbox after disabling your antivirus software, you may need to remove duplicate emails Outlook manually. To do this, select the duplicate items and press the Delete key on your keyboard.
6) Using Preview mode
With the Preview mode, you can easily compare messages and choose to delete the duplicates. Here is how.
7) Third-Party Outlook Duplicates Remover
You can also opt for a reliable Third-Party Outlook Duplicate Remover tool for permanently removing the Outlook duplicates. The third-party duplicate email remover for Outlook tools are developed in such a way that you do not need to worry about duplicate emails or other duplicate Outlook items anymore.
One such application is Kernel for Outlook Duplicates Remover. The software automatically finds and removes duplicate items from your Outlook. It is the best and proven solution to remove Outlook duplicate items. It provides you many options to find duplicate items; for example, you can specify a date range to find duplicates. A free version of the software is also available that allows you to remove duplicate items. You can also remove ten items from each folder with this free Outlook Duplicates Remover tool.
Follow the step by step process to remove duplicates in MS Outlook:
Step 1: Launch Kernel for Outlook Duplicates Remover application and click on the Add Task button to add or create a new task.
Step 2: In the Task Creation Wizard, give Task Name and Task Description and click Next to proceed.
Step 3: Now, search for duplicate items by selecting folders; you can prioritize the folders to search for duplicate items with the Up and Down buttons and click the Next button for the next step.
Step 4: Choose the type of operation that you want to perform on the duplicate items searched by the software and click Next.
Step 5: In this step, you can compare the emails and other items by selecting the properties as shown in the screenshot. Click on the Next button for the final step.
Step 6: If you want to save the progress report of the task, click Save Report and finally hit the Finish button.
As you have noticed, there is no manual solution to find and delete duplicate items in Outlook except that you read every email and delete them. To save your valuable time, you can opt for an automated solution like Kernel for Outlook Duplicates Remover.
Eliminating duplicate items in Microsoft Outlook is crucial to maintain a neat and organized mailbox. You can choose from various techniques as discussed in the blog or a reliable third-party tool. However, it is crucial to guarantee the safety of your data when implementing any of these methods.
Kernel for Outlook Duplicate Remover is a reliable, user-friendly tool designed specifically for this purpose. It uses advanced algorithms to detect and remove duplicate items from your mailbox without the risk of losing any crucial data.
So, if you’re tired of struggling with duplicate items in your Outlook mailbox and want a powerful, efficient solution, this utility is the perfect choice. Visit our website today to learn more about this fantastic tool and download the free trial version.
A- Deleted items contain all redundant messages. When you clean up a conversation, all messages related to the conversation are moved to the Deleted Items folder. Your Deleted Items folder also allows you to retrieve messages.
A- In your contact folders, it’s not possible to automatically remove duplicate contacts once they’ve been created. Outlook allows you to import contacts from a file and then check for duplicates when you re-import them.
The article provides various methods for removing duplicate items in Outlook, including using the built-in clean up tool. This method helped me to remove duplicate items from my MS Outlook 2016. Thank you sharing it!
This article was incredibly helpful in helping me sort through my duplicated Outlook items. It was easy to follow and very organized. Thanks for the great advice!
Your post helped me to remove duplicate emails and other data file from MS Outlook 2016. I have used the above mentioned tool. It worked very smoothly without facing any problem. I would also like to recommend this article to others.