How to find one specific folder in Outlook among very many folders?

Question

I have Outlook 2013 and have many folders down the side for all my contacts and supplier emails received from them. I want to be able to find a folder quickly without having to trail down through them all . can anyone help me out here please

Answer 1

Outlook does not provide the direct functionality to search for folders. However there are workarounds that are discussed in another question here on superuser: How can I find a lost folder in Outlook?. User Loïc MICHEL created some custom scripts to help search for folders

An external website (thetechieguy.com) also created a solution with detailed instructions How to search outlook for a folder name

Hope this helps

Answer 2

From Find or Select a folder by typing its name :

1. Set the focus to your active folder in the Navigation Pane by pressing SHIFT+F6 (depending on your current focus, you may need to press it multiple times)
2. Once your focus is within the Navigation Pane, type the first few letters of the folder name to select it.
3. Your current folder remains the active folder so you can easily move the messages from it to your other folder.

Note: Only currently visible/expanded folders will be found. Collapsed subfolders will not be found. See also Starting Outlook with all folders collapsed/expanded.

If you don’t want to keep your folders expanded and actually want to open a specific folder just by typing its name, then this VBA macro from VBOffice will do the trick.

Private m_Folder As Outlook.MAPIFolder
Private m_Find As String
Private m_Wildcard As Boolean

Private Const SpeedUp As Boolean = True
Private Const StopAtFirstMatch As Boolean = True

Public Sub FindFolder()
  Dim Name$
  Dim Folders As Outlook.Folders

  Set m_Folder = Nothing
  m_Find = ""
  m_Wildcard = False

  Name = InputBox("Find name:", "Search folder")
  If Len(Trim$(Name)) = 0 Then Exit Sub
  m_Find = Name

  m_Find = LCase$(m_Find)
  m_Find = Replace(m_Find, "%", "*")
  m_Wildcard = (InStr(m_Find, "*"))

  Set Folders = Application.Session.Folders
  LoopFolders Folders

  If Not m_Folder Is Nothing Then
    If MsgBox("Activate folder: " & vbCrLf & m_Folder.FolderPath, vbQuestion Or vbYesNo) = vbYes Then
      Set Application.ActiveExplorer.CurrentFolder = m_Folder
    End If
  Else
    MsgBox "Not found", vbInformation
  End If
End Sub

Private Sub LoopFolders(Folders As Outlook.Folders)
  Dim F As Outlook.MAPIFolder
  Dim Found As Boolean

  If SpeedUp = False Then DoEvents

  For Each F In Folders
    If m_Wildcard Then
      Found = (LCase$(F.Name) Like m_Find)
    Else
      Found = (LCase$(F.Name) = m_Find)
    End If

    If Found Then
      If StopAtFirstMatch = False Then
        If MsgBox("Found: " & vbCrLf & F.FolderPath & vbCRLF & vbCrLf & "Continue?", vbQuestion Or vbYesNo) = vbYes Then
          Found = False
        End If
      End If
    End If
    If Found Then
      Set m_Folder = F
      Exit For
    Else
      LoopFolders F.Folders
      If Not m_Folder Is Nothing Then Exit For
    End If
  Next
End Sub

Answer 3

Quick Folders add-in does exactly that. It is a commercial product developed by my company, but you can use the free trial to find you folder(s) as required.