An Outlook user asks: “Without starting Outlook 2007, I moved the IMAP pst from C to D. I hoped Outlook would ask me where the file is. However it creates a new one in the same location. How do I make Outlook use the new location?”
That method is used to move *.pst files used by POP3 accounts, it won’t work with the IMAP protocol. (Actually, it’s not recommended that you use that method for any PST – you should move the PST then point the profile to the new location before opening Outlook.)
While we don’t recommend moving the IMAP *.pst unless your drive space is tight, you can move the IMAP *.pst using the following steps. You cannot reuse an IMAP data file.
These methods work with Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010. However, we recommend using ForcePSTPath with Outlook 2010.
Outlook 2010 users report problems sending and receiving email. In Outlook 2010, make sure you select the sent folder in More Settings. Or use the ForcePSTPath key then add the account to your profile after creating the key. I have tested the ForcePSTPath with IMAP accounts in Outlook 2010, without error.
Symbolic Links and Junction Points can be used. See How to Move Shell Folders (and contents) for more information.
Alternately, you can set the ForcePSTPath registry key (Outlook 2007 and 2010) to change the default data file path from C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook. This change will not move existing pst files in your profile. If you create new accounts in your profile (or a new profile), the pst will be placed in the path entered in the registry. This does not affect the location of Exchange or MSN ost files.
Reusing an IMAP data file | Move the PST | Using ForcePSTPath
Reusing an IMAP data file
We receive a lot of questions from people who want to reuse the IMAP data file, either on a new computer or with a new profile. Sorry, this is not possible currently. Only the profile that created the IMAP data file can use it.
Using it in a new profile would not make the process faster as Outlook would re-sync every thing in the data file.
Note: If you download full messages, you can open and view the contents of the pst file in another Outlook profile. While this may suffice as a backup of the mailbox or an archive, if you need to clean out the IMAP account, we recommend moving messages to a local pst file to insure the full message bodies are downloaded.
Steps to Move the PST
First, close Outlook then make sure Outlook is not listed in Task Manager, Processes tab a few minutes after you close it.
- Open the profile (Control panel, Mail) and click on Data files.
- Select the IMAP acct and click Open Folder to open the folder containing the PST.
- Move the PST to the desired location. Do not rename the file Outlook creates a new file in the default location if you try to rename it – you can only move it.
- Switch to the Data Files window and double click on the account’s data file.
- Now you’ll get the ‘can’t find’ error and can tell outlook where to find it.
- Close the dialogs and you are ready to restart outlook.
Video Tutorial: Move IMAP *.pst
Using the ForcePSTPath regedit
You can use the ForcePSTPath regedit to change the default *.pst path. This works for POP3, IMAP, and SharePoint data files but does not affect Exchange and MSN ost files – those are always saved in default path under the user account (C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook on Windows 7 and Vista).
The ForcePSTPath key will relocate the pst files used by IMAP accounts in Outlook 2010 but not in earlier versions. If you use Outlook 2007, you’ll need to move the pst file and repoint the profile to it, following the steps above.
Note: This does not change the path for existing accounts. It works only for accounts created after the key is set.
Create the folder you want to store the IMAP pst files in before you set the key.
In Start menu, Run (Windows key + R) or the Start Search field (Win7 and Vista only) type regedit and click OK.
Browse to the following subkey in the registry.
In Outlook 2007 (POP3, Sharepoint, and default pst files only):
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Outlook
In Outlook 2010 go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Outlook
Right click on the key and choose New then click String Value.
String Value: ForcePSTPath with your desired data path as the value data
Click OK and edit the registry editor. If Outlook is open, close it then restart. Newly created data files will default to the location. Existing data files would need to be moved.
Be sure the path exists before adding the key to the registry. If it does not exist, Outlook will drop back to the default Microsoft\Outlook location under the user account (and in Outlook 2010, to My Documents\Outlook files for POP3 and additional pst files.)
Remember to use double \\ between folder names in the path in the reg file. (Use single slashes if you edit the registry directly.)
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Outlook] "ForcePSTPath"="C:\\folder\\folder\\folder\\folder\\folder"
ForcePSTPath-2007 | ForcePSTPath-2010
Remember: you need to edit the path name, the save it using the .reg extension (or change the extension to reg after saving). Then you need to double click on the reg file to update the registry!
For more information, see the following Microsoft KB article
How to change the default location that Outlook 2003 or Outlook 2002 uses to create or to open a personal folders (.pst) file
More Information
This method will work with SharePoint and Internet Calendars. You can’t (easily) move Outlook Connector message stores for Hotmail/MSN/Live accounts. In my experience, this method is mostly reliable but does occasionally get ‘lost’ and a new pst is made in the default location.
If the above methods don’t work and you are serious about moving the pst, you can use symbolic links or junction points. See Symbolic Links (MSDN), Junction Points (MSDN), and How to Move Shell Folders (and contents) for more information.
See To move a Personal Folders .pst file for instructions for moving POP3 pst files and Hotmail Connector files.
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Last reviewed on Jan 18, 2012
This does not work with Vista-64 or Windows 7-64.
The move works fine and all emails can be seen, but Outlook will no longer syncronize the IMAP folders afterwards. Had to move it back and it worked again.
What version of Outlook? We have reports that Outlook 2010 won’t send/receive after using the move method. Using the ForcePSTPath key should work though.
Hi
I have tried in vain all evening, both methods, to no avail.
Can’t send and receive after moving PST file and the registry edit doesn’t work either.
Using Windows 7 x64 with Outlook 2007.
I tried other methods and this method looks way too complicated.
But I have found another method (at least for MS Outlook 2010) to move the PST data file to a new folder.
1. Move/copy data file to desired location. (yes if you move this file it will generate another PST file straight away but don’t worry about this at this time)
2. In outlook go to FILE>ACCOUNTSETTINGS
3. On the email tab select the email account of the PST file you have just copied/moved and delete/remove.
4. On the same email tab now select NEW.
5. Select the E-MAIL ACCOUNT BUTTON> NEXT.
6. Select MANUALLY CONFIGURE SEVER SETTING OR ADDITIONAL SEVER TYPE, button > NEXT.
7. Select INTERNET E-MAIL button> NEXT.
8. N.B. Select EXISTING OUTLOOK DATA FILE button and then browse/locate the PST file that you moved.
9. Fill in the usual email account setting for your account for the rest of the form.
10. Delete old PST file in windows explorer.
11. Done :)
This method won’t work for IMAP folders (but will work for POP3). You can’t select a pst when you create an IMAP account – IMAP accounts create their own folders and need to be moved using one of the methods in the article.
Instructions to move POP3 pst files is here: http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/config/to-move-an-outlook-personal-folders-pst-file/
Yeah, IMAP accounts in Outlook 2010 are buggy when the pst is moved.
Did you try using the registry key – set it before creating the profile so outlook uses the new location from the start.
your right I didn’t realise after I changed type from POP3 to IMAP that the option to select folder location was removed, should have known it would not be that easy.
oh well!!!
Nothing in Outlook is ever easy. *G*
hi, I m on win 7 64bits and outlook 2007. I tried the ForcePSTPath method, including another path (T:\OUTLOOK) . I cut the pst and moved into this folder, but outlook keep creating a new file in c:… when opening it…. so for me no solutions :(
Did you create the account in the profile after setting the key?
Did the folders in the path exist before setting the key?
It works with 32bit Outlook. I’ll have to wait until I get back in my office later in the week, to test it on 64-bit windows/64-bit Outlook.
Thanks!! I have been looking how to do this for ages and moving the pst didn’t work.
Oulook is such a pain!
I used the ForcePSTPath for Outlook 2010 64-Bit to move 2 IMAP emails to another partition. Absolutely awesome.
Glad it helped. And yes, Outlook can be a royal pain. :)
Hi sorry to come back so late…. i dont remember! I had too much stress so i had to quit what i was doing.
Reading again your post i notice that its written “This does not change the path for existing accounts. It works only for accounts created after the key is set.” . So if i have well understood i cant move this folder in 2010/imap.
I need to move the one that exist and dont want to re-create it..
Do you think junction.exe could work? http://windows7themes.net/how-to-create-junction-points-in-windows-7.html
That applies to the registry entry only. You need to use the instructions under Steps to move the pst. (and in the tutorial).
It should work. I haven’t used that utility but tested junction points and symbolic links to move imap pst files years ago. If you repoint the folder, all of the contents in it need to be moved.
“Steps to Move PST” is very helpful. Thank you.
Microsoft should be taken back to the shed and paddled on this one. Does anyone at Microsoft proof their KB articles? They just assume everyone uses POP3 accounts and skip the rest. Their instructions at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook-help/move-outlook-information-to-another-computer-that-has-outlook-2010-installed-HA102544948.aspx were a waste of time for this Outlook 2010 IMAP user on 64-bit Windows 7. I kept trying to find the “Deliver new messages to” settings but never found them. I just rebuilt my computer and have spent more time on trying to bring in my old IMAP PST file than on anything else.
I assume you discovered that ‘deliver to’ does not exist for IMAP accounts. While you can backup or move the imap pst files, they can only be used as a backup file (if you downloaded full messages) – imap accounts, like outlook connector and exchange, need to create their own data file and sync it with the online mailbox. Moving the pst would not save badnwidth as outlook will empty it and recync everything.
Thanks a lot for the “Using the ForcePSTPath regedit” hint! After trying for several days in vane to make Outlook 2010 / Win7-64bit keep its data on another partition than the program and almost giving up this method worked for me. Registry edited, new account created in Outlook, everything goes to the place I want.
Well I finally gave up on moving IMAP folders (Win7-64 bit & Outlook 2010). After I reset Outlook to first run, deleted all pst files I used the ForcePSTPath regedit option, but, after re-setup, email accounts this only moved the POP accounts. The IMAP’s reset in C-drive. Next I tried moving IMAP folders as in above video. That, I thought worked… but after checking I found out while I was recieving mail, it was not sending. Only work around was to manually click on Send Receive Tab/individual account Inbox. The Send All account, while it had listed IMAP accounts in it, did not work The IMAP’s were not showing up in the Send&Receive Progress window. So if I wanted to manually send each account, it would work. So went back to defaults on C-drive.
Why does Microsoft see fit to lock user data files locations? I had C-drive failure between backups that cost me alot of work. I now try to keep all user data on D-drive and back it up daily. Now I have to set backup to locate these individual files. Oh well…
They don’t make it easy to move the imap folders because its not really necessary to back them up as its a server based account and the pst file is tied to the account that created it. If the local drive fails, you’ll need to re-download all the imap mail if you recreate the account – you can’t re-use an imap pst with a new imap account (you can open it independent of the imap account though). Keeping a backup of the imap pst in case the imap server fails doesn’t necessarily work – unless you download full message bodies.
The only time its useful to move imap is if the C drive is full.
@Davis – are you sure the path you entered into forcepst key was valid? Outlook 2010 defaults POP3 and extra pst files to My Documents\Outlook files on its own. If the path is not valid, Outlook falls back to the default paths – it will not create the folders in the path.
I just retested the key and it does work for imap pst files too (screenshot) – if you add the key to the registry. (I changed the path to “ForcePSTPath”=”C:\\Users\\Diane\\Documents” but didn’t run the reg file the first time i tried it -silly me, what was I thinking. :) ) Sending works too.
On the sending problem – go into Send and Receive settings, select the group then Edit. Is the account enabled for sending? Normally, it is enabled by default.
In Outlook 2010 (32-bit) running on Win 7 Enterprise 64-bit, I ran into the same problem of being able to receive e-mails, but not able to send e-mails — after moving the IMAP-based PST file. To resolve the problem, and as suggested in the thread above, here is what worked for me:
1) Added the ForcePSTPath registry item as described at the beginning of this posting. For what it’s worth:
i) I added a “Expandable String Value” instead “String Value”
ii) I only used single backslashes rather than double backslashes (e.g., c:\mail)
2) Rebooted (probably not necessary, but did so to be sure)
3) Added a brand new profile, being careful to select the same IMAP settings as my original profile.
4) Upon opening Outlook, I immediately checked to confirm that the *.pst file was being created in my newly-specified location.
As an FYI, double slashes are only used when editing the reg files. When you edit the registry directly you always use single slashes – you can copy the path from Windows Explorer address bar and paste it into the value field.
Argh! I have spent most of the day in an attempt to move my pst files to My Documents. You’d think I was performing brain surgery blindfolded. I moved my old pst file to a new folder under: c:\Users\Susan\Documents\OUTLOOK. I removed all profiles in Outlook before I started ForcePSTpath and added a new key with the value: c:\Users\Susan\Documents\OUTLOOK. I opened Outlook was asked to create a new profile which I did. Under data files, I see Personal Folders pointed to the new file under Documents. The email account however is pointed towards anew file in the darn Users\Susan\App Data etc. default location. I cannot “remove” this new pst file in the App Data location becuase it is linked to the email account that I just set up after adding the registry key.
I am tempted to uninstall and reinstall Outlook but I’m not sure that will help. I am so tired of this and wondering why I even cared where Windows wanted to put the darn pst file. Any recommendations? Thanks.
Uninstall /reinstall won’t help. What version of Outlook and Windows do you use?
Outlook 2007, windows 7 Ultimate, 64 bit. I have since moved the pst files back to App Data\Local\Microsoft\Outlook, removed the ForcePSTpath key, and removed/added my single email account back to Outlook. I can get my mail now, but cannot get Notes or Contacts. I have created a monster and have forgotten whatever it was that made me want to mess with this in the first place! Since Outlook now has several PST files, I wonder if there is any software that will clean up pst files, that is, remove duplicate emails, merge pst files, or separate them into custom groups. I appreciate your help.
I’m assuming appointments and tasks are missing to – if so, they were in a different pst file than you have now. Go to the folder where the psts are and check the filee size and date – 256kb is empty. Really old dates (from before you last had the contacts in outlook) are probably archive files or just old pst that were duplicated at some point. Go to Tools, Account settings, Data file tab and click Add. You can browse to the folder where the pst files are and open them in the profile. You can use import to get everything into the new pst or move the contents yourself – open a folder, select all, then use the Move to folder command or drag and drop. For appointments, you need to use a list view – view, current view, by category – if you are going to move them yourself. See Duplicate remover tools for addins you can use to remove duplicates. Most work on any folder.
Hi
I have Outlook 2007 with Windows 7 professional 64-bit. Like some of the people in this discussion list, I couldn’t synchronize the IMAP folders after moving, and also creating a new profile after the ForcePSTPath did not work (it still created the pst-file in the old location, even though I indicated the full path in the string value, and the folders of this new path already existed). I tried the latter method many different times, but it wouldn’t work. I noticed that the people who had the same problem with ForcePSTPath all have Outlook 2007 and Windows 7 64-bit, and those who succeeded seem to have Outlook 2010 and Windows 7 64-bit. Might this be the problem? Thanks for your recommendations.
I’ll see if i can repro the problems in Outlook 2007, but it should work just fine – forcepstpath is supported in all versions.
Using the wrong key will prevent it from working – for 2007, its HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Outlook
Thanks for your reply.
This is exactly the key that I used. I tried it six different times using all possible alternatives that I could think of; for example, once putting the new path in quotation marks and another time trying without quotation marks, etc. But the result was always the same. I also tried it on another computer that had win 7 home premium 64, instead of win 7 professional 64. Same result. Thank you for your advice.
It’s not windows – unless the path is one that is protected through permissions. A quickie test this morning failed in outlook 2007 – I’m checking with my contacts to find out why its not working with imap accounts in 2007.
Thanks, I look forward to your feedback.
Howdy Guys.
I’ve had the joy myself of hitting my head against a brick wall due to migrating to outlook 2010 for staff this month and let me say office 2010 is hopeless. We previously in 2007 we used Group Policy to perform the path for outlook %HOMEDRIVE%\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook which worked well. of course you had to manually move the IMAP pst but this was not too much of a problem and it didn’t cause a serious problem if it switched back. With outlook 2010 has been a nightmare with outlook profiles getting in the slightest tizzy if the pst file moves at all. Which is made even worse as outlook keeps ignoring the imap.pst file frequently and creating a new 1 in the c drive. -.- this happens to both Migrated and new profiles (which it creates in the right spot) too.
Any words of wisdom before i tell Microsoft where to shove it.
FYI Windows XP 32 Bit – Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus
Have you ever solved the problem with outlook 2007 and windows 7 64 bit? Would appreciate your follow-up.
Thnx.
Hello!
I’m using Outlook 2010 x64 on Windows 7 x64 and having applied the ‘ForcePSTPath’ registry setting to force my PSTs to go to the “C:\Users\\My Outlook Files” directory. I then created a brand new Outlook profile for an IMAP account but was surprised to find two pst files were created in the “C:\Users\\My Outlook Files” directory. The two files are named:
[1] – .pst (~70 MB in size)
[2] Outlook Data File – .pst (265 KB in size)
Furthermore, when I open Outlook and select the ‘Folder List’ in the navigation pane I see two sets of folders, one named ‘Outlook Data File’ and the other with my mail account name. Only the second set of folders contain e-mails; the ‘Outlook Data File’ e-mail folders are empty.
In my account settings/E-mail tab I can see that new messages are delivered to PST [1] above, but on the ‘Data Files’ tab it is PST [2] above that is set as the default. I cannot set PST [1] as the default as the ‘Set as Default’ is disabled!
Is this the usual behaviour, i.e., for 2 PST files to be created for a single IMAP account, and for 2 sets of folders to appear in Outlook, one of which is essentially empty?
Kind regards,
/Neil
It looks like my use of angled brackets wasn’t appreciated! The 2 PST file names are (this time with square brackets):
[1] [mail_account_name] – [profile_name].pst (~70 MB in size)
[2] Outlook Data File – [profile_name].pst (265 KB in size)
Kind regards,
/Neil
Yes, that is normal when you use an IMAP account. You need the outlook data file to hold calendar and contacts because they can’t be stored in the imap pst file. The data file used by calendar and contacts needs to be set as default because the imap data file can’t be set as default.
This worked great for me, thank you! I have a SSD drive for my OS, and a 2tb files drive and needed the space badly. I had to remove and re-ad my IMAP account after using the ForcePSTpath setting (I tried using the moved IMAP file, but had the send mail error as you mentioned). Otherwise it’s all good.
Windows7x64; Outlook 2010
I configured my IMAP account as POP3 in Outlook 2010 (x86), with reference to my incoming server like imap.mydomain.com
That way I was able to attach to the user selectable pst file (far away from the C drive).
Everything seems to work fine, although I have only been running with this account for a couple of hours.
If you configured it as POP3, you won’t have the benefits of using IMAP… moving pst files for POP3 will work fine.