outlook challenge- move messages to folders at the end of the day

[adolf hamster]

in the quest for a clean inbox, i'm wondering if it's possible to set up outlook to automatically run a bunch of rules to move my mail into various folders.

basically once a day i'd want to say move all my messages from a certain correspondant to a folder, or from a mailing list into a folder, extra bonus points if it's only read messages that are moved.

i've done a bit of looking into this and it seems that doing this by having mail automatically moved once read isn't a thing but perhaps there's a macro way of doing it?

 

[AHarvey]

Online Outlook or installed Outlook?

Just had a quick look through the advanced options and there doesn't seem to be a way of creating a rule that only runs on read emails, however, I've found a workaround.

You set a recurring task to run for each rule and use VBA code to get that task to run the rule for you:

https://www.datanumen.com/blogs/schedule-specific-outlook-rules-run-specific-time/

It'll give a base to work from and maybe you can code it that it's for read emails only.

Another option would be https://www.msoutlook.info/question/move-messages-automatically-when-marked-as-read

Change the way you use outlook, have the rules run automatically and create an unread emails folder to show all unread emails, when you read it it'll disappear from this folder.

 

[adolf hamster]

it's the desktop outlook app, it's mainly to archive certain things automatically that i dont want cluttering up the place after i've read them, and yes i am too lazy for those precious few clicks.

 

[HangTime]

Generally speaking I think that categories are probably a better way of managing emails than folders (you can achieve largely the same effect as folders but with added benefits like assigning multiple categories to a single mail); if you setup rules to auto-assign categories and then have views over the categories that might give you what you need.

In terms of just viewing unread emails there's an out the box search folder for that.

When it comes to 'clutter', I don't really see that as a problem, as it can all be managed with views rather than having to physically move stuff around.

That said, I'm sure there are some niche use cases where moving things to different folders are desirable e.g:
-If performance is really bad using filtered views
-If there is some sort of auto-deletion routine in operation than removes emails from your main folders older than a certain age (forcing you to have an archiving strategy)