Outlook - How to Create and Manage Rules

Rules allow you to organize your email. They can be used to automate moving, flagging or responding to email messages among other uses.

Accessing Rules

1. via File -> "Manage Rules and Alerts"
2. via right-clicking a message, locating "Rules" in the drop down and selecting "Create Rule..."

Creating Rules

1. Go to the Rules menu and select "New Rule..."
2. Select the template you want to use for the rule
3.  Edit the description by clicking on the underlined values and selecting wanted value. All underlined values must be designated for the rule to function properly.

4. Select any conditions you want applied to the rule. These add additional qualifiers that are check for before the rule is applied.
   Make sure to edit the added underlined values in the description added by the conditions.

   

5. Add any additional actions you want the rule to perform.
   Make sure to edit the added underlined values in the description added by the additional actions.

   
6. Name the rule.
7. Below where you name the rule, make sure "Turn on this rule" is selected and if you want to have the rule check existing messages, select "Run this rule now on messages already in..."

8. Click Finish

   Your new rule has been added.

Managing Rules

• To edit an existing rule, double click it or select the rule and click "Change Rule" then "Edit Rule Settings". The menu will look the same as when you are creating a new rule.
• You can copy or delete a rule by selecting it and pressing "Copy" or "Delete" above the list of rules.
• To change the order rules are run in, select the rule you want to move and use the up and down arrows to the left of "Run Rules Now..."
• If a rule for some reason is not being applied, you can select "Run Rules Now..." to force all of your rules to run