Using ‘Conditional Formatting’ to Quickly Sort and Filter Emails

Do you struggle with sifting through dozens of emails every day only to discover most are irrelevant or spam? Outlook has a built-in feature to help you sift through those emails, so you only see what’s most important to you.

Conditional formatting is an Outlook feature that will automatically color code your emails based on specific criteria you select. This criterion can be based on level of importance, sender names, subject lines, specific keywords, or distribution lists.

The IT team has put together this brief guide with photos to help walk you through setting up conditional formatting.

From any email folder, select View > View Settings > Conditional Formatting.

In the Conditional Formatting dialog box, click Add.

Type a name for your rule name in the Name box, and then click Condition.

In the Condition drop down, select the criteria you want to use, like the subject (Subject) or who the email is from (From).

Fill in the appropriate boxes that come up (depending on your choice from Step 4), then select the font color you want to use and click Save.

Now all the messages in your inbox and all future messages that match the criteria you provided will be the color you chose. You can, if you wish, create more than one rule. If you need any help with this, please feel free to reach out to IT Director Chris Pacifico for assistance.