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Self-Help Guide

Backup & Restore Outlook Data

Hardware fails, laptops get stolen, and files get deleted by accident. A backup takes ten minutes and turns a disaster into an inconvenience. Here is how to save your Outlook mail, contacts, and calendar, and how to get them back.

Do this before you need it

The best time to back up is while everything still works. Set a reminder to run a backup once a month, and keep the file somewhere separate from your computer, such as an external drive or cloud storage.

Choose your system

The steps differ between Windows and Mac. Pick yours below.

Backup

Save your Outlook data on Windows

This creates a single .pst file containing everything you choose to include.

  1. Open Outlook on your Windows computer.
  2. Click the "File" tab in the top-left corner.
  3. Choose "Open & Export", then select "Import/Export".
  4. Select "Export to a file" and click Next.
  5. Choose "Outlook Data File (.pst)" and click Next.
  6. Select the folders you want to back up. Tick "Include subfolders". To back up everything, select the account name at the very top of the list. This captures mail, contacts, and calendar in one go.
  7. Click "Browse", choose where to save the file, give it a name, then click Finish. Name it something you will recognise later, such as "Outlook-Backup-March-2026".
Optional but recommended. Outlook offers to password-protect the file. If you set a password, store it somewhere safe. Without it, the backup cannot be opened.
Restore

Bring your data back on Windows

Use this on a new computer, or after a reinstall, to pull everything back in from your .pst file.

  1. Open Outlook on your Windows computer.
  2. Click the "File" tab in the top-left corner.
  3. Choose "Open & Export", then select "Import/Export".
  4. Select "Import from another program or file" and click Next.
  5. Choose "Outlook Data File (.pst)" and click Next.
  6. Click "Browse", find your backup file, select it, then click Next.
  7. Choose which folders to import, or select "Import items into the same folder" to restore everything to where it was.
  8. Click Finish. Outlook imports the data into your mailbox. Large backups can take a few minutes.

Where to keep your backup

A backup sitting on the same laptop as the original is not a backup. If the machine dies, both go with it. Keep a copy on an external drive, or in OneDrive, Google Drive, or Dropbox. Two copies in two places is the rule.

Want us to handle it?

If you would rather not do this yourself, or something has already gone wrong, message us on WhatsApp and we will sort it out.

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