This utility converts email messages from PST format, which is strictly used by Microsoft Outlook, to the Adobe PDF document format, which is available across all platforms and operating systems.
Windows users can open PST data files directly from Outlook, while users of other systems lack this ability. Converting a PST file to PDF documents enables you to easily exchange emails with others who don't have Outlook. Almost any web browser is capable of viewing PDF files.
Exporting mail from PST to PDF files is an effective way to save it in a universal format for viewing on any device.
What is an Outlook PST data file?
Microsoft Outlook uses the PST file format to store its data such as messages, contacts, appointments and meetings, tasks, notes, documents, journal entries, etc. All data can be located in folders of distinct types: mail, calendars, and others. Besides, PST files store important additional properties of Outlook items and folders. For example, rules and alerts, view settings, or search folders.
What are Adobe PDF document files?
The PDF (Portable Document Format) was created in the 90s by Adobe and was originally designed for saving and printing documents in a cross-platform manner. After a while, it became popular, and PDF viewers appeared everywhere. This format is mainly used for electronic documents exchange.
A PDF file can contain formatted text, graphics, fonts and attachments. This allows you to save most of your email message data into PDF and share it with other people.
Why convert PST to PDF?
There are several reasons to perform PST2PDF conversion:
- Compatibility. PST is an internal Microsoft Outlook format. To access your email and attachments stored in the PST file, you need to have Outlook installed. To access messages without Outlook, you need to convert them to a different format. PDF is a convenient format for searching, viewing, and printing. It can store attachments and keeps the original HTML formatting with images.
- Cross-platform. Microsoft Office Outlook supporting PST data files only works on Windows. While programs for viewing and printing PDF are available on all modern platforms, including smartphones. Use PDF files to share the email messages, and the recipient is guaranteed to be able to open and read them, regardless of what device or operating system they use.
- Separate file for each message. The PST file stores all emails, so if it gets damaged, all mail will be lost at once. When converting from PST to PDF, messages are saved in separate files. If you lose one of them, the rest will remain intact.
- Images and formatting. Images in messages are often just links to external Internet resources, and if the resource becomes unavailable, the images disappear from messages. During PST to PDF conversion, external images are being downloaded into messages. You can be sure that you have saved your emails in their original form.
- Security. The PDF format allows you to set a password on each file or digitally sign them, protecting your confidential data. PST format do not provide serious protection; most programs simply ignore PST passwords. Besides, there are many free programs available to simply remove passwords from PST data files.
- Compliance requirements. Often, regulatory or corporate policies require all electronic correspondence be kept for a certain period. Converting received and sent messages to PDF files is a great alternative to storing large amounts of data on expensive mail servers.
Our utility does not require manual connection of PST data files to your Outlook profile. Once you have everything set up and running, the work will be done automatically. It doesn't matter how many PST files you need to convert.
Why can't you use online services to convert PST to PDF?
PST files contain your important and confidential data. When you use an online service to convert email from PST to PDF, all your sensitive data is transferred to someone else's server, including private messages, contacts, tasks, and notes. The data is processed on an unknown computer, and you can't control it in any way. Only then can you download the resulting PDF documents.
In contrast to online converters, our utility works strictly on your computer. Information from the PST data file is not uploaded anywhere. Your data will not fall into the wrong hands.
How is saving PST to PDF better than other formats?
- PDF viewers are available across all platforms.
- Resulting documents are suitable for easy sharing with other users.
- PDF files retain formatted text and message subject, date, recipients, and sender and attachment files.
- PDF format is convenient for printing because this is its main purpose.
How to convert PST to PDF?
- Select the source folder with the PST files and the target folder for resulting PDF documents.
- Specify whether to create a separate folder for each PST file or create the original Outlook folder structure.
- Optionally, you can configure additional settings and filters, such as the date range, sent or received messages, and others.
- Run the utility; everything else will be done automatically.
How to customize file names when saving PDF from PST?
You can select a folder for PDF files on your disk or network share or specify a template for flexible naming of folders and PDF files.
The utility allows you to flexibly configure the names of resulting folders and PDF files. To do this, you can use macros in the target path. For example, the message subject, the names and domains of the sender or recipients, dates, Windows environment variables, and many other values.
Advanced users may want to use regular expressions to extract strictly the necessary parts of the subject, body, and other message fields in the target folder and file names.
Are there any limits when converting from PST to PDF?
There are no limitations on the number and size of are converted and received. You can convert an unlimited number of folders or files as often as you want.
The utility saves from PST to PDF emails only. All other Outlook items, such as appointments, meetings, and contacts, will be skipped.
How to perform mass mail conversion from PST to PDF?
The program can bulk convert PST to PDF in batch scripts, using PowerShell, Task Scheduler, and other automation tools. To do this, use the command-line utility in the product. If you run several command-line apps at once, the automatic conversion of several PST files to PDF will become much faster due to parallel execution.
To schedule PST to PDF conversion, use the command-line application provided by the product along with the standard Windows Task Scheduler. This allows you to flexibly configure schedule parameters and use the utility in your scenarios even without logging into a user account.
By converting email messages from Outlook PST data files to Adobe PDF documents, you will get separate files for each message, arranged in folders on a disk, according to the original folder hierarchy. Later, you can view and print messages with attachments in PDF format on any device and any operating system without the need to install Outlook.
* This utility is for non-commercial home use only. It will not run in domain enviroment. Some of the described features and support for domain enviroment are available in advanced version of the utility only. Free version may have additional limitations.