How to delete or resend an email message stuck in Outlook's Outbox

The article explains how you can quickly remove or resend emails that are stuck in your Outbox. The solutions work on all systems and all versions of Outlook 2007 to Outlook 365.

An email message may become stuck in Outlook because of different reasons. You can find the detailed information about the causes and remedies in this article: Why an email is stuck in Outbox and how to fix this.

But no matter what the reason is, you need to get a stuck e-mail out of the Outbox somehow. In fact, there are several ways you can remove a hanging message and we are going to cover them from simplest to more complex.

How to resend a message stuck in the Outbox

A very simple two-step method that you should try first.

  1. Drag the stuck message from the Outlook Outbox to any other folder, e.g. to Drafts. Drag the stuck message from the Outbox to Drafts
  2. Switch to the Drafts folder, open the message and click the Send button. That's it! The message will be sent. Open the message in the Drafts folder and click the Send button

Tip. Before moving a stuck message to the Drafts folder, go to the Sent Items folder and check if the message was actually sent. If it was, delete the message from the Outbox since there is no need to perform the steps above.

How to remove a stuck email from the Outbox

A quick and easy way to delete a hanging message.

If the message has been hanging in your Outbox for a while and you don't actually want to sent it anymore, follow the below steps to delete it.

  1. Go to the Outbox and double click a stuck message to open it.
  2. Close the message.
  3. Right-click the message and choose Delete from the context menu. Delete an email message stuck in the Outbox.

Set Outlook to work offline and then remove a stuck message

A general solution that works in most cases.

If the previous method did not work for you, e.g. if you are continuously getting "Outlook has already begun transmitting this message", then you will have to invest a couple more minutes and go through the below steps.

Tip: Before you proceed, make sure you have given Outlook enough time to complete sending. For example, if you are a sending an email with heavy attachments, the process may take up to 10 - 15 minutes or even longer, depending on your Internet bandwidth. So, you may be thinking the message is stuck while Outlook is doing its best to transmit it.

  1. Set Outlook to Work Offline.
    • In Outlook 2010 and higher, go to the Send/Receive tab, Preferences group and click "Work Offline".
    • In Outlook 2007 and lower, click File > Work Offline.
    Click the Work Offline button to switch to the offline mode.
  2. Close Outlook.
  3. Open the Windows Task Manager. You can do this by right clicking the taskbar and choosing "Start Task Manager" from the pop-up menu or by pressing CTRL + SHIFT + ESC. Then switch to the Processes tab and verify that no outlook.exe process is there. If there is one, select it and click End Process. End a hanging Outlook process.
  4. Start Outlook again.
  5. Go to the Outbox and open a hanging message.
  6. Now you can either delete the stuck message or move it to the Drafts folder and remove the attachment if it is too big in size and this is the root of the problem. Then you can try to send the message again.
  7. Bring Outlook back on-line by clicking the "Work Offline" button.
  8. Click Send/Receive and see if the message is gone.

Create a new .pst file and then delete a stuck email

A more complex way, use it as the last resort if none of the above methods have worked.

  1. Create a new .pst file.
    • In Outlook 2010 - 365, you do this via File > Account Settings > Account Settings… > Data Files > Add…
    • In Outlook 2007 and older, go to File > New > Outlook Data File…
    Create a new .pst file.

    Name your new .pst file, e.g. "New PST" and click OK.

  2. Make the newly created .pst file the default one. In the "Accounting Settings" window, select it and click the "Set as Default" button. Set the newly created .pst file as the default one.
  3. Outlook will show the "Mail Delivery Location" dialog asking you if you really want to change the Default Outlook Data file. Click OK to confirm your choice. Confirm that you really want to change the Default Outlook Data file.
  4. Restart Outlook and you will see that your original .pst file shows up as an additional set of folders. Now you can easily remove the stuck email message from that secondary Outbox.
  5. Set the original .pst file as the default delivery location again (see step 2 above).
  6. Restart Outlook.

That's all! I hope at least one of the above techniques has worked for you. If you still have a message stuck in your Outbox, don't hesitate to leave a comment and we will try to make it send.

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155 comments

  1. Hi there,
    My problem is that something is sticking up my outbox and I think it is hidden as I have managed to delete or put in drafts all the guilty emails but still wont send and now I get the error message - too many messages but none are showing up.
    Before this there was a way to search for these hidden files using the start menu but I can't remember?
    Thanks for the help
    Alice

  2. A ton of thanks. Set Outlook to work offline and then remove a stuck message works for me. Thank you again...:)

  3. If you try method three. (Working with outlook off-line) you may find it is successful if you also disable (switch off) your router before reopening outlook.

    Apparently, even with outlook being "off Line" if the internet is still available, somewhere in the background outlook will still attempt to send the hanging message thus preventing its deletion.

    Happy deleting, A

    • I tried everything to delete an email with a 78mb video file attached, but it stuck in Outbox. I use Outlook 2007 and Win 10. Tried for hours. Came to this tip - switched off the router and it worked immediately

  4. Hi

    I have tried all teh suggestions but without success. I have one message stuck. It contains a few attachments. The same email was successfully sent to three other recipients.

    I was trying to send the email to 'brighouse.echo@brighouseecho.co.uk' It is only 28MB

    I am using Outlook with Windows 8.

    Any ideas?

    A

    • Hello Angie,

      Are you trying to resend or delete a message? If the former, then probably your server blocks sending if a message contains any attachment in a forbidden format like .reg, .exe or something else.

  5. YAY! Thank you, it worked going into process. The opening outbox from the search did not delete the 78mb file I tried to send and could not shake. WHOOP!

  6. I got to the third method and outlook crashes when I name the new data file and click ok. Also, no "account settings" box comes up in 2007, to "set as default" even if it would allow me to create the new data file. So this method does not appear to work in 2007. But mine are stuck (I believe) because I moved and the outgoing server it's trying to use, is no longer the right setting.

  7. Trying to figure out how to delete.all my message in my email i have over 999

    • Hi Quintina,

      You can try creating a new pst, copying all your folders and messages there and after that deleting the problematic .pst file with all those 99 emails in Outbox.

  8. Hi,
    Thanks for ur help it really worked.

  9. Thanks alot! Worked out at the windows task manager step.

  10. Hi Svetlana

    This is my 3rd occurence of having a large email stuck in Outlook folder. This time it was a huge email and your advice on Ending the the process via Task Manager sorted the problem.
    Thank you very much. I will pocket you in my great solutions pocket.

    Kindest regards

    Jim

    • Hi Jim,

      I'm glad to know the solution worked for you. And your "great solutions pocket" put a smile on my face, thank you for that! :)

  11. Thanks. I had to use the general approach and take Outlook offline. Worked fine,

  12. Hi, I have an email I sent in Outlook from my iPhone and I can't figure out how to delete it - the file is too large and when I go into my outbox it won't let me delete the message it's trying to send.

    Thanks,

    Kendra

    • Hello Kendra,

      If the message contains a large attachment, please try to open if from your Outbox and delete the attachment first.

  13. I have been trying to figure out this problem for quite a while. From what I can tell, it is not a new issue as there are a lot of postings reporting a similar issue regardless of the version of Outlook.

    I do not have a solution but I have noticed that whenever a message gets stuck, the email address is enclosed with quotation marks. If I retype the address instead of a simple REPLY with no quotation marks, the message goes out immediately.

    Has anyone else observed the same behavior?

    • Yes, that often works. But Outlook is so unpredictable in its behaviour. A colleague had three messages stuck today. We removed the '' from one of them, and one of the others went at the same time, even though it still had the ''

      Astonishing.

    • Thanks so much. This worked immediately for me. I also noticed that I did not have this person in my Contacts, so I simply added them. Hopefully, I don't have to go through this again.

  14. When i am reverting on a mail then the receiver is getting a blank mail.

    suggest me.

    thanks

    • Hi Ashish,

      Does this happen with all the replies you send or with certain recipients only? Anyway, I am afraid it is impossible to pin down the source of the problem remotely. There may be plenty of causes both on your side and on the recipient's side. Try sending plain text messages instead of HTML. If this does not work, you may have some IT person try to diagnose the problem on site or contact Microsoft support for assistance.

  15. Thanks for your tips. I have had an email that has been hanging in my outbox for months now, holding up all my other emails. Your tips were to the point and exactly what I needed, it worked.

    I am very grateful.

    Thanks

    • Hi Yolanda,

      I am really glad to know the tips were helpful. Thank you for your feedback!

      • hello svetlana how are you

  16. Worked a treat. Thank you very very much. :)

  17. Yes, I know (and now my boss knows too...) but the problem remains that the e-mail is stuck in the outgoing mail box...

    • Hi Mia,

      I you have tried all the suggestions described in the article, then I have no other ideas. Really sorry for not being able to help you with this issue.

  18. Hi
    There's a computer at the office (my boss's!) where I also tried everything without luck... Here's some information: Outlook 2010, imap, appears normal in outbox (not bold), 1 messsage with attachment (70MB), recevier gmail.com
    Any way to get this solved?

    • you need to check on windows update and antivirus
      and if they are all up to date am sure you should be able to send and receive emails without any problem

  19. Hello

    I followed every single instructions above and still can not delete the stuck email in the outbox.

    Any other ideas please?

    • Hi Ali,

      Please specify how many messages are stuck. Do all or some of them contain an attachment? What domain name are you sending the message(s) to? Also, which Outlook version and account type do you use?

    • Just click on send/receive and you will see show progress and cancel all click on cancel all and go to outbox now delete the stuccked email from outbox.

      • Tried a million ways to delete emails with pic attachments this worked. Thank you so much!

  20. Tried all 3 methods and still have the message stuck in the outbox unable to delete

    • Hi Karen,

      You can check other solutions explained in this article: Why an email is stuck in Outbox and how to make it send. If these do not help either, then please specify you version of Outlook, account type (Exchanger server, POP, IMAP, Gmail etc.), and how exactly the stuck message appear in your Outbox (normal or bold) and we will try to figure out the cause.

      • I tried every trick I knew and this issue was making me crazy! Your article had the problem fixed in seconds! Thank you so much!

        Katy

      • Karen, I tried everything under the Sun to try to remove a large file I had stuck on my Outbox in Outlook.com. Until this morning: I went to outlook.com and the file stuck on the outbox[1] was still there. I RIGHT CLICK'D IT AND DRAGGED IT TO THE RECYCLE BIN. Immediately it was gone from the Outbox.

        John

        • Thanks so much, John! So glad I saw your comment... it's the only thing that worked. Wish I had tried that first!

          • Awesome tip dude, solved my issue in a second!

      • Hey. That's a Cool tip. Thank you!! :)

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