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Find Email in Outlook – Instructions and Video Lesson

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Find Email in Outlook: Video Lesson

            This video lesson, title “Searching for Messages,” shows you how to find email in Outlook. This video lesson is from our complete Outlook tutorial, titled “Mastering Outlook Made Easy v.2019 and 365.”

Find Email in Outlook: Overview

            There are many ways to find email in Outlook. When you have multiple messages in your “Inbox” folder, or any mail folder, it can be difficult to find specific messages. In this case, you can use the “Instant Search” or “Microsoft Search” feature of Outlook, depending on which version of Outlook you are using, to quickly find messages.

            To find email in Outlook, first open the mail folder within which to look for the email, like the “Inbox” folder. Then click either into the “Instant Search” field in the mail folder’s header pane above the list of emails or into the “Microsoft Search” bar in the middle of the Title Bar, depending on which tool appears in the version of Outlook you are using.

            Then enter the text for which to search to find the matching messages. If using the older “Instant Search” feature, then searching begins automatically as you type. If using the newer Microsoft Search, then after typing your search term into the box, press the “Enter” key on your keyboard or click the “Search” right-pointing arrow button at the right end of the field to perform the search. Either way, Outlook then shows any items that match the search criteria.

Find Email in Outlook - Instructions: A user searching for text within an email folder in Outlook using Microsoft Search.

Find Email in Outlook – Instructions: A user searching for text within an email folder in Outlook using Microsoft Search.

            To display all the messages again after you finish searching, click the “Close Search” button at the right end of either bar or click the “Close Search” button in the “Close” button group of the “Search” contextual tab (formerly the “Search” tab of the “Search Tools” contextual tab) in the Ribbon.

Find Email in Outlook: Instructions

  1. To find email in Outlook, open the mail folder within which to look for the email, like the “Inbox” folder.
  2. Then click either into the “Instant Search” field in the mail folder’s header pane above the list of emails or into the “Microsoft Search” bar in the middle of the Title Bar, depending on your Outlook version.
  3. Then enter the text for which to search to find the matching messages.
  4. If using the older “Instant Search” feature, then searching begins automatically as you type.
  5. If using the newer Microsoft Search, type your search term into the box and then either press the “Enter” key on your keyboard or click the “Search” right-pointing arrow button at the field’s right end to perform the search.
  6. Either way, Outlook then shows any items that match the search criteria.
  7. To display all the messages again after you finish searching, click the “Close Search” button at the right end of either bar or click the “Close Search” button in the “Close” button group of the “Search” contextual tab (formerly the “Search” tab of the “Search Tools” contextual tab) in the Ribbon.
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