How to Save Emails from Windows Live Mail to External Hard Drive?

Admin | Email Conversion email migration How to's Software Technology | 4 minutes read | Last updated on February 8th, 2023,

Thinking a way out of how to save emails from Windows Live Mail to external hard drive! No worries, the blog has provided easiest way to save emails from Windows Live Mail to external hard drive in a precise way.

Email plays a crucial role for almost every user and organization these days. All their personal and formal communications are somehow dependent on email applications. For e.g. consider a scenario where a user had lost all its emails. However, such type of situation is not bearable. So, the blog will discuss how to get out from this kind of circumstances by taking backup of emails. In the further segment, we will discuss about Windows Live Mail and different ways to save emails from WLM.

How Someone Lose Emails and Why to Save Emails from Windows Live Mail to External Hard Drive?

Every email application has a limit to hold the email files, and when this limit exceeds, one need to save those from email program to local system. However, it is nothing new that data saved on a system is always vulnerable to loss. There are several situations due to which a user can lose some of the important emails:

  • Virus/Malware Attack
  • Failure of Hard Disk
  • Corruption
  • Formatting of System
  • Accidental File Deletion

Some of the above situations can also result in the permanent loss of data. But, do not worry, saving the files beforehand can give peaceable sleep at night. Saving Windows Live Mail emails on external hard drive is a wise choice as it makes the data accessible on multiple locations any time. Similarly, taking the backup of crucial data in different file types also works as magic as this will help to keep the data secure almost forever.

Save Emails from Windows Live Mail to External Hard Drive

A user can easily save emails from Windows Live Mail to external hard drive or on local system by implementing the steps mentioned below:

  1. At first, create empty folder where one need to save WLM emails.
  2. Now, run Windows Live Mail and login to account by entering credentials.
  3. After program opens, click Windows Live Mail, select Export Email and choose Email Messages.
  4. Click Browse, choose folder that you made to save WLM files. Similarly, you can choose external device. Click Next to proceed.
  5. Select desired folders or all folders to export and press Next.
  6. Wait till process finishes.
  7. Once done, hit Finish button.

After executing the above steps successfully, check exported data in new exported folder created earlier for external hard drive. You will see that all emails saved in EML file type.

Automated Approach to Save Emails from Windows Live Mail 

The best effective way to save emails from Windows Live Mail to external hard drive is by performing the conversion of Windows Live Mail files to a different format. By implementing this, one will have the access of WLM messages on more than one platform, so if one platform not opening the file due to any reason then it can do the same using another platform. Download Windows Live Mail Converter on the system which is an all-in-one utility that provide plethora of saving options such as PST, PDF, MSG, EML, MBOX, XPS, RTF, DOC and more.

Step 1. Open WLM Converter on Windows OS.

home screen

Step 2. The application mail screen will show two options to load WLM database:

Convert Configured Windows Live Mail Profile – The option enabled when Live Mail is installed on the system. It will directly detect the account and display its path for direct conversion i.e. C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail.

Convert Separately Saved Windows Live Mail Mailboxes – The option includes two buttons i.e. Select Files and Select Folders. It allows to manually add desired files or folders of WLM for conversion.

Scan & Formatted Scan

After choosing desired option, click Next.

Step 3. The tool now shows the list of WLM items with checkboxes. By clicking the desired checkbox, one can perform selective conversion and saved desired files. Now, click Next.

view data files

Step 4. Click the dropdown arrow of Select Saving Option and choose file type as per need. It will display options such as PST, PDF, MSG, EML, MBOX, MHT, HTML, DOC, RTF, TXT etc.

Select Folders Sub-Folders

Step 5. Once the desired file type selected, click Browse button to set destination path to save resultant file.

Browse for Folder

Step 6. Apply filters to save specified WLM emails.

advanced gmail filters

Step 7. At last, press Convert button.

Select Folders Sub-Folders

The tool will immediately start the process and complete it by showing a message on the screen “Conversion Completed Successfully”. Click OK button to end the process. However, as soon as you click OK, the tool will display log report in TXT format that can be saved as a record for further reference.

Conclusion

The segment discussed how to save emails from Windows Live Mail to external hard drive. Moreover, the write-up has provided traditional methods with automated method. In automated method, the direct conversion is performed i.e. Windows Live Mail to PST and then a user can save the same on external hard drive. Apart from this, there are other formats too that one can use to backup Live Mail files on different formats.