Mail App - Backup Email Messages in Windows 8

How to Backup Your "Mail" App Email Messages in Windows 8 and 8.1
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   Information

Windows Mail App in Windows 8 and 8.1 does not have an archive & backup function. Luckily all messages are stored locally in a Mail folder located deep in the hidden AppData folder.

This tutorial will show you how to search, copy, archive, and backup your "Mail" app email messages in Windows 8, Windows RT, Windows 8.1, and Windows RT 8.1.

   Note

Messages are stored as EML files. To read them outside the Windows Mail App you need a mail client capable of handling EML files (Microsoft Outlook, Windows Live Mail, Mozilla Thunderbird or similar).

Step 1:

Locate the Mail Folder

Windows Mail App stores the messages locally in the following folder:

[HL]C:\Users\Your_Username[/HL]\AppData\Local\Packages\microsoft.windowscommunicationsapps_[HL]XXXXX[/HL]\LocalState\Indexed\LiveComm\[HL]YYYYY[/HL]\[HL]ZZZZZZ-ZZZZ[/HL]\Mail

Please notice:

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  [*=1]C:\Users\Your_Username is the default location of your personal hidden AppData folder. If you have relocated the main Users folder or your personal user folder, change the path accordingly
  [*=1]XXXXX and YYYYY are random alphanumerical strings, ZZZZZZ-ZZZZ is a numerical string consisting of groups of 6 digits and 4 digits separated with a hyphen

The main Mail folder has subfolders for each mail account set up in Mail App. The subfolder for the first account you have set up, the so called login Microsoft Account, is named as "1", all other accounts (subfolders) have a two digit hexadecimal folder name as seen in this screenshot:

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Various mail folders like Inbox, Sent, Drafts, Outbox and so on have all their individual subfolders under the email accounts main folder.

   Warning

Please be extremely careful when browsing and handling these folders as your Mail Application might stop working if the folders are removed, renamed or moved. Also do not delete individual email messages in File Explorer, use Mail App's Delete function for that.

Step 2:

Create a Desktop Shortcut for the Mail Folder

Right click on Desktop, select New > Shortcut and create a shortcut for your Mail folder. See this tutorial for creating shortcuts.

Notice that AppData is by default a hidden folder. If you cannot browse to the AppData and its subfolders you need to first enable showing hidden files and folders as told in this tutorial.

Step 3:

Browse and Search your Messages

Open the Mail folder by double clicking the shortcut you created in Step 2.

First thing you'll notice when browsing your Mail folder is that the messages do have a very unfriendly name. Here the messages from my main account's Inbox, there's no way to tell which message is what:

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Luckily there's a practical workaround. Simply type an asterisk (*) to File Explorer search field; this will show you the senders and titles of messages instead of the unfriendly names:

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In fact anything you type into the search field changes the Explorer behavior, showing more understandable titles than the default unfriendly file names.

Now you can use Windows Search to find and sort your messages. Here a few examples:

• modified:yesterday from:Harry
  • this would find all messages sent yesterday by Harry (any sender with the string Harry in sender name)
• modified:2012 from:="Harry Smith"
  • this would find all messages sent in 2012 by Harry Smith (exact sender name)
• CC:Kari
  • this would find all messages where Kari is in CC instead of or in addition to TO
• BCC:Kari
  • same as above but BCC instead of CC
• TO:Anne
  • this would find A) all messages sent by you to a receiver with the string Anne in receiver name or address, and B) all messages sent by someone else where Anne is mentioned in TO field
• Content:="Eight Forums"
  • this would find all messages where the title or message body contains the exact phrase Eight Forums
• Content:Eight
  • this would find all messages where the title or message body contains the string Eight as an individual word or part of a word

Step 4:

Backup your Messages

Create a new folder wherever you'd like to, for instance I have the Mail Backup Folder located in Documents. Using the Windows Search as told in previous step find the messages you'd like to backup and copy them to the backup folder.

That's it. Easy and fast, quite simple.

Kari

Related Tutorials

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• How to Change New Mail Notification Sound in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Turn Email Notifications On or Off for Mail App in Windows 8 amd 8.1
• How to Turn On or Off and Change Signature in Mail App in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Create a "Mail" App Shortcut in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Turn On or Off to Send Automatic Replies in Mail app in Windows 8.1
• How to Add an Account to Mail App in Windows 8.1 and Windows RT 8.1
• How to Remove an Account from Mail App in Windows 8.1 and Windows RT 8.1
• How to Change Preferred Email Address for Outlook.com Alias in Windows 8 Mail App
• How to Set how Often and Far Back to Download Email in Windows 8 Mail App
• How to Mark Messages as Junk or Not Junk in Mail App for Windows 8.1

 

[Brink]

Great tutorial Kari.

 

[Kari]

Thanks Shawn. Luckily you guys got that layout issue sorted.

 

[Uptix]

Why not just make a Library containing the c:\users\username\AppData folder, and let that be backed up with File History?

Is that too simple, or have I missed something?

cheers

 

[gayxq]

Thank you for your article, but could you please tell me it's useful to backup the mail info? the mail info saved on Microsoft sever, need to backup mail info?

 

[Brink]

Hello gayxq,

What did you mean by "mail info"?

This tutorial is only for backing up your email messages.

 

[gayxq]

Yes, i know it will backup the email messages, but all the emails saved on Microsoft Sever, is the backup useful? thank you.

 

[Brink]

Having your messages saved on the server is fine if that's all you wanted or need to use. Backing them up yourself is just another precautionary option available to help make sure that you do not lose any emails that you can't afford to lose. It's always best to be safe than sorry later.

 

[gayxq]

OK, thank you.

 

[Brink]

You're welcome.

 

[Grabo]

Hi, thanks for the instructions how to backup your emails in Windows mail app, but i tied testing the backup and restoring the emails back to the windows mail app folder and they did not show up, have i missed something here? i deleted the emails in the windows mail app, then copied back the emails back to the mail folder. but emails still not showing, any suggestions.

 

[2TallinVA]

Hi, thanks for the instructions how to backup your emails in Windows mail app, but i tied testing the backup and restoring the emails back to the windows mail app folder and they did not show up, have i missed something here? i deleted the emails in the windows mail app, then copied back the emails back to the mail folder. but emails still not showing, any suggestions.

I'm encountering the exact same problem.

 

[Kari]

You cannot restore the backed up email messages. When a message in Mail app has been deleted and the Deleted folder is empty, there's no way to restore the message.

The only point of having the mail messages backed up is just that: to have it at least on the local PC when it has been deleted from the Mail app and the mail server.