HomeOutlookEasy Steps to Import Contacts from Outlook Express to Outlook 2013

Easy Steps to Import Contacts from Outlook Express to Outlook 2013

Microsoft Outlook is an email client application that was introduced with earlier versions of Windows operating system. However, later it was replaced with Windows Mail in Windows Vista. Over the years, Microsoft has made many changes in Outlook. Today, MS Outlook 2013 is the latest email client from Microsoft. In spite of being developed by Microsoft for the same purpose, both Outlook Express and MS Outlook have several differences.

Due to several advanced features, MS Outlook is being used by many users. Consider a scenario, where you are working on an older version of Windows using Outlook Express, and you want to switch to another system using MS Outlook as an email client. In addition, you want to access your Outlook Express contacts in MS Outlook. For, this you need to import your Outlook Express contacts to MS Outlook. But how?

Importing Outlook Express contacts to MS Outlook is not a direct process. Moreover, you might face several issues while migrating from Outlook Express to MS Outlook. You might get the following error message while moving your Internet mail to MS Outlook 2013 (64 bit).

“Either there is no default mail client or the current mail client cannot fulfill the messaging request. Please run Microsoft Outlook and set it as the default mail client.”

“The export could not be performed.”

“An error occurred while initializing MAPI.”

In spite of being an advanced version, MS Outlook 2013 does not support importing of contacts and other information from Outlook Express and Windows Live Mail. However, you can import data from Outlook Express and Windows Live Mail into the 32 bit version of MS Outlook 2013, either on the same computer or a different computer. If you still want to use the contacts in MS Outlook 2013 964 bit), then you can import the PST file from Outlook 2013 (32 bit) to MS Outlook 2013 (64 bit).

The contacts are stored in an address book called the Windows Address Book (WAB), which is compatible across Microsoft Outlook 98 (Internet Mail) and Microsoft Internet (Mail and News).

You can easily move an individual contact or group of contacts within WAB to MS Outlook by simply dragging them. For WAB Mail to Outlook Conversion, you need to follow the below mentioned steps.

  1. Close any application using WAB file.
  2. Search for the WAB file through Files and Folders option of the Windows system. For this go to Start->Find->Files and Folders.
  3. An Open box appears up.
  4. Search for the WAB file.
  5. From the list of different WAB files, double-click the desired WAB file.
  6. Open Outlook.
  7. Expand the Outlook Contacts folder.
  8. Select the contacts from WAB and drag it to the Contacts folder.
  9. In Outlook, click Save and close the newly created form.

In addition to move contacts, you can also move mails, calendar, notes, etc. from Outlook Express to MS Outlook. You can also follow the below mentioned steps to access your Outlook Express data (contacts) in MS Outlook.

  1. Launch Outlook Express
  2. From the File option, go to Export->Address Book
  3. Select the contacts file (in a Comma Separated Values format)
  4. Click Export
  5. Choose a desired location to save the file
  6. Give the file a suitable name
  7. Click Next
  8. Select all the fields and press Finish
  9. A message appears indicating that the file has been exported
  10. Close all the open dialog boxes

Once done, you need to import the file to MS Outlook. For this, you need to follow the below mentioned steps.

  1. Launch MS Outlook.
  2. From the File section, go to Open->Import.
  3. In the Import wizard, choose the option ‘Import from another program or file’
  4. Click Next.
  5. Choose CSV format.
  6. Click Next.
  7. Choose the CSV file you have exported from Outlook Express.
  8. Click Next.
  9. Choose the destination folder as the Contacts folder.
  10. Click Next.
  11. Click Finish.

The above-mentioned steps are applicable if Outlook is installed on the same system. However, in case Outlook is installed on a different system, the process would be entirely different. There are different ways of importing Outlook Express contacts to Outlook 2013 on a different machine.
The easiest way to do this is to copy the Outlook data from the old machine to the new machine and import it to the MS Outlook in the same way as described above. However, you can also import your data (contacts) from Windows Mail (WM) or Windows Live Mail to MS Outlook. For this, you must install Windows Mail or Windows Live Mail and configure the data with them before importing it to the Outlook.

Note: You can use either WM or WLM from your Outlook machine to restore the data if the message is from Windows Mail. However, in case the message store belongs to Windows Live Mail, then you can only use Windows Live Mail (WLM) on your Outlook machine to restore the data.

You need to follow the below mentioned steps to move your data from WM or WLM from one system to another and then to MS Outlook.

  1. Move the backed up data to the  new computer.
  2. Right-click the data folder and click properties.
  3. Uncheck the ‘Read Only’ attribute option.
  4. Launch either Windows Mail or Windows Live Mail on the new machine.
  5. From the File option go to Import->Messages.
  6. Choose the source application.
  7. Click Next.
  8. Choose the type of data or information to be imported. You can choose the backup folder by specifying the location.
  9. Click OK.
  10. Choose Folder(s) you wish to import.
  11. Click Next.
  12. Click Finish once done.
  13. You can now easily import the data from newly configured Windows Mail or Windows Live Mail to MS Outlook. This can be done by following the same steps mentioned earlier in this section.

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