recover deleted folders in Outlook Express

If you have accidentally deleted a folder inside your Inbox in Outlook Express, but still have a backup of the DBX files, It isn’t too hard to recover the folder. You’ll notice just copying the DBX file back into your Outlook Express Identities folder doesn’t resolve it.

First, you need to find the folder your mail files reside in. Open Outlook Express, click Tools, Options and the Maintenance tab. Click the Store Folder button in the lower right and get the path of your Identity folder. Copy it to your clipboard by highlighting it and pressing Ctrl-C.

Close those panels out and highlight your Inbox. Click File, New, Folder. Create a new folder with EXACTLY the same name as the deleted folder. (name the folder exactly as the backup dbx file you have. i.e. if the dbx file was named “work email.dbx”, name the folder “work email”.)

After creating the folder, close Outlook Express, open Explorer and go to your Identity folder you got in the first step. rename the existing “work email.dbx” to “work email.old”(see prior step), then copy your backup DBX file in.

Open Outlook Express and your email folder is restored. The reason for the extra steps was to tell the Inbox to look for your folder’s DBX file again. Once it knows to look for it, your old DBX file will work.