How to deal with ‘OST file too large’ issue

As we send and receive more and more emails, the size of Outlook OST file tends to increase rapidly. And sometimes it becomes too large that we are unable to handle it. In this particular blog, I will be discussing the best manual tricks to deal with the “OST file too large” issue.

If you use an Office 365, Exchange, or Outlook.com account, a copy of your mailbox will be store at Offline Outlook data file(.OST). It is one of the core formats of MS Outlook and OST files too have certain predefined limits. When that limit exceeds might give rise to no of issues.

Why OST files get oversized?

Since the day you activated your account, all the data you have generated or received have been stored in the OST file. It includes all your emails, attachments, calendar schedules, tasks, contacts, hidden items, etc. And when you forget to delete unimportant data it gets stacked and exceeds the Outlook file size limit.

Issues in Outlook due to Oversized OST file

• Can’t open or load .ost file
• The problem in adding data to existing Exchange .ost file
• An occurrence of error messages during synchronization
• Pauses in MS Outlook Program
• Failure in fixing synchronization issues between the OST file and MS exchange server.

Manual tricks to fix the size of Outlook OST file

Method 1: Archiving all OST file data

Archiving your data might reduce the OST file size and clear some space occupied on the server. You can also change archiving the OST file location on your server. Archiving the OST file may prevent your OST file to cross predefined size limit and can resolve your OST file size too large issue. Follow the below steps to archive a file.

Step 1: Click on the File tab >> Click Cleanup Tools >> Select Mailbox Cleanup.

Step 2: There are two options are available:

• By clicking the Auto-archive option you can move the older items in the mailbox.
• Click Empty and delete items from the Deleted items folder.

Method 2: Compacting Outlook data file

OST file size can be reduced by using the inbuilt utility in Outlook. Reducing the size might help in improving Outlook performance. To compress the OST file, follow the given steps:

1. First of all, delete the items which you do not require at all.
2. Open folder list view and in Navigation pane, right click on the folder, click Deleted items and click the Empty folder.
3. In Outlook, click on the File tab and from Account Settings and select Account Settings.
4. Click on Data Files, select the data files to be compacted and click on Settings. 

5. In the open dialog box, click the Advanced tab and then click on Outlook Data File Settings.

6. Now in the dialog box that appears, click on Compact Now to compress files.

Professional Solution:

In case all these tricks do not work then you can opt for the OST Recovery tool. This is the ultimate solution to all your problems. It is capable of recovering data from corrupt Outlook data file OST and can swiftly reduce the size of your large OST files. This software has got the fastest scanning speed supported by all the versions of Microsoft Outlook. You can also go for a free demo version of this tool.

Bottom Lines:

In this blog, I have mentioned all the tricks and techniques regarding the OST file too large issue. All the problems and their solutions have been discussed in detail. You can try the manual methods as well as the professional solution to resolve your problem.

 

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