Moving Email to a Different Folder
Organizing your email is essential for quick and accurate work. It also reduces the chance that you will accidentally delete an email you really need. In the Outlook Inbox down arrow to an email that you want to move to a different folder. Press and hold down the Control and Shift keys and hit the letter y. A "Copy Items" dialogue box will pop up. Down arrow to the "Inbox" folder, then right arrow, and down arrow to the folder where you want to copy the email. Hit the Enter key one time. The email you were over is copied to the folder you selected, and the original is still in the "Inbox."
You can move an email to a different folder, which means that you are taking it out of the "Inbox" folder and placing it in another folder. This promotes less emails in the main "Inbox" list, and better organization. Move to an email that you want to move to another folder. Press and hold down the Control and Shift keys, and hit the letter v. A "Move Items" combo box pops up. Down arrow to the "Inbox" folder, then right arrow, then down arrow to the folder where you want to move the email. Hit the Enter key and the email will be moved.
Control Shift y means to copy emails
Control Shift v means to move emails
You can copy or move one or more emails at a time. Following are methods for selecting emails to move or copy.
Method One: Arrow to the single email that you want to copy or move and use one of the above key commands to bring up the dialogue box for copy or move, down arrow to the "Inbox" folder, right arrow, down arrow to the folder you want and hit the Enter key.
Method Two: If there are two or more emails that are directly in order in the "Inbox," press and hold down the Shift key and down arrow to highlight those emails. Then move to the copy or move dialogue box, find the folder you want and hit the Enter key.
Method Three: If there is more than one email you want to copy or move, but they are not in direct order, move to the first of these emails, press and hold down the Control key, down arrow to the next email, hit the space bar, down arrow to the next email, hit the space bar, and so on until you have selected all of the emails you want to copy or move. Next, move to the copy or move dialogue box, find the folder you want and hit the Enter key.
Method Four: Use the Outlook Inbox "Search" box by pressing and holding down the Control key and hitting the letter e. Type the name of a person, organization, business, etc., and hit Enter. Tab to get back to the list of emails (about four times, but you will need to listen to what the screen reader is saying). At this point you can press and hold down the Control key and hit the letter a to highlight all of the emails you have searched for, and then issue the command to bring up the copy or move dialogue box. Find the folder you want to copy of move the emails to and hit the Enter key.
Try the following activity to increase your skill. After you are quick and accurate, move to the "BACK" link at the bottom of this page to move back to the "Outlook Lessons" web page.
1. Open Outlook.
2. Down arrow to an email you want to copy to a different folder.
3. Press and hold down the Control and Shift keys and hit the letter y.
4. Down or up arrow to the "Inbox" item.
5. Right arrow one time.
6. Down arrow to the folder where you want to copy the email.
7. Hit the Enter key one time.
8. Press and hold down the Shift key and down arrow to highlight more than one email.
9. Press and hold down the Control and Shift keys and hit the letter v to move the emails to a different folder.
10. Down or up arrow to the "Inbox" item.
11. Right arrow.
12. Down arrow to the folder where you want to move the email.
13. Hit the Enter key.
14. Press and hold down the Control key, down arrow two times and hit the space bar to highlight a second email. Keep the Control key held down and down arrow two times and hit the space bar to highlight a third email.
15. Release the Control key.
16. Press Control Shift y to bring up the "Copy Items" dialogue box.
17. Down or up arrow to the "Inbox" item.
18. Right arrow.
19. Down arrow to the folder you want.
20. Hit the Enter key.
21. Press and hold down the Control key and hit the letter e.
22. Type the name of a person, organization, school, etc. that you want to search for.
23. Hit the Enter key.
24. Hit the Tab key (about 4 times) to get back to the list of emails. All of the emails now listed should be related to the search you just did.
25. Press and hold down the Control key and hit the letter a to highlight all of the listed emails.
26. Press and hold down the Control and Shift keys and hit the letter v to bring up the "Move Items" dialogue box.
27. Down or up arrow to the "Inbox" item.
28. Right arrow.
29. Down arrow to the folder you want.
30. Hit the Enter key and the emails will be moved to the folder you selected.
31. Practice the above steps until you are quick and accurate.