How to stop delete key from deleting the entire email in outlook?

Anonymous
2024-02-18T13:18:35+00:00

When I press delete - like in any other Microsoft tool, i mean delete the immediate text. But for some reason, Outlook started to use this key to delete e-mail. Where can I swich it off?

It´s really frustrating, I really wonder how people at Microsoft think. For example, they added annoying function where I have to first confirm editing a Word file before I start editing it (WHY?). But now I can accidentally delete an entire e-mail by a very predictable action. WHY! Just stop changing things for worse. Everytime I reinstall my windows, I need to go through the ordeal of swiching all these "bright ideas" off.

Outlook | Windows | Classic Outlook for Windows | For home

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  1. Anonymous
    2025-04-12T06:57:13+00:00

    I think you can assume that for many of us that is not the case. The problem has persisted for a very long time, during which we've had numerous Outlook restarts/reboots/system updates and it still persists.

    It is one of the most egregious examples of atrocious human-computer interface 'features' that I've ever seen. Certainly 'seen but not fixed' and nobody at MS seeming to care about it

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  2. Anonymous
    2025-04-11T23:29:46+00:00

    Restarting outlook seemed to help resolve the issue for me.

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  3. Anonymous
    2025-03-19T18:47:39+00:00

    My outlook is now working properly. I am using Outlook 2016 on Windows 11. When I press the DEL key the deleted email goes into the Trash folder now. Wonderful! But the embarrassing thing is, I don't know what I changed. :( This was fixed in the email settings as I was fooling around with them, but I don't know which change fixed it. And I know this is useless to anyone reading this but I can at least give you a clue that somewhere in the settings something did solve this delete problem, at least in Outlook 2016.

    A couple of other clues are that I am using Windows 11 and I believe I also installed the new outlook (in Feb 2025) (the free version for windows) so maybe that repaired something too that affected Outlook 2016, I just don't know.

    Sorry for the stupidity of this post....

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  4. Anonymous
    2025-03-19T16:11:48+00:00

    This issue remains unsolved and is quite serious!!

    After none of the solutions in this thread worked for me, I found a workaround using an external program (AutoHotkey). I set it up to neutralize the "Del" key whenever Outlook is active.

    It effectively prevents accidental email deletions. The only minor tradeoff is that I now rely on Backspace for character deletion — a small price to pay for safeguarding my inbox.

    #IfWinActive Inbox          ; Put the correct Title in your Language here 

Del:: 

{ 

	; do nothing or give an ErrorMsg e.g. by "MsgBox, Deletion not possible"

} 

#IfWinActive

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  5. Anonymous
    2025-03-19T14:43:45+00:00

    this suggestion does not work

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