These instructions are for Outlook 365.  They are specific to the Technology Matters email server setup. Please adapt for your own environment.

Reference for these instructions taken from https://www.msoutlook.info/question/705 . Use this link for older Outlook 2010, Outlook 2013 and Outlook 2016


Outlook’s Auto Account Setup will indeed first try to configure your webmail account as an IMAP account. So when your mailbox supports both IMAP and POP3 connections, it will get configured as an IMAP account but this is not ideal for everyone.


While you cannot directly “convert” your existing IMAP account to a POP3 account, it is still a relatively simple process consisting of the following steps:

  1. Add your POP3 account.
  2. Transfer your mail folders.
  3. Optionally; Export and import your message rules.
  4. Remove your current IMAP account.


Step 1: Add your POP3 account

Adding your POP3 account can be done via the Account Settings dialog;


  • Outlook as part of Office 365
    The new setup wizard doesn’t normally allow you to add the same account twice. You can still do so however when you use the Mail settings as follows;
    1. File-> Info-> Account Settings-> Manage Profiles




    2. Close Outlook.

    3. In the dialog that opens choose: Email Accounts…



    4. On the Email tab, press the New… button to create your POP account with the same email address as your IMAP.


    5. use the option “Manual setup or additional server types”.



      Choose the POP or IMAP selection NOT Office 365



    6. When setting up the POP3 account manually, make sure you have the server configuration details at hand. (this should have been provided to you). Make sure "new outlook data file" is selected. and POP3 is your chosen Account Type


    7.  Click [More Settings] and enter the correct Port numbers that were provided with the server settings before you began. Make sure you use SSL/TLS encryption method for both incoming and outgoing servers.
      Extra Tip: Upon configuring your POP3 account, set it to leave a copy on the server for at least a couple of days. 


Step 2: Transfer your email folders or messages from the IMAP to POP account

Move button


After adding your account as a POP3 account, you’ll notice that all the emails that are in the Inbox folder of your IMAP account get downloaded. Any subfolders that you might have and your Sent Items folder won’t be downloaded because POP3 only supports downloading from the main mailbox folder (Inbox).

To transfer your data, select the messages or folders that you want to have in your POP3 mailbox and initiate a copy or move command or use the drag & drop method. If you drag & drop mails or folders via your right mouse button, you’ll get an option to either move or copy the selected items.


To keep the read/unread/replied/forwarded status of messages that are in your IMAP Inbox, you can first empty the Inbox folder of your POP3 account to prevent duplicates. 


Note: You cannot move or copy the Inbox or Sent Items folders since these are special folders. To move across these items, you’ll have to select the messages instead of the folder. 



Step 2a: Export and import your message rules (optional)

When you have any message rules configured for your IMAP account, and you want to use these for your POP3 account as well, it is recommended to export your rules before you remove your IMAP account.

For certain configurations, the rules for a specific account could be deleted when you remove the account. When you export them and then later notice that you’ve lost them, you can easily import them again. After importing the rules, you must reselect the folder for any rule with the “move to folder” action.

For step-by-step instructions to backup and restore your message rules see; Import/Export message rules.


Step 3: Remove your current IMAP account

Once all your data has been copied to your POP3 mailbox, you can safely remove your IMAP account.


  1. Go to  File> Info > Account settings > Account settings
  2. Select the IMAP email account form the list and click [Remove]