# Outlook:  How to use categories?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outlook-how-to-use-categories/626546>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 28, 2012, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outlook-how-to-use-categories/626546 "2012-06-28T04:49:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\
**Post date:** [June 28, 2012, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outlook-how-to-use-categories/626546/1 "2012-06-28T04:49:05Z")

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I tried using categories on my e-mail, but I have to set the category each time I sent the e- mail. I would have thought that for an e-mail chain once you set it, the category would stay set. Am I missing something?

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**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\
**Post date:** [June 28, 2012, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outlook-how-to-use-categories/626546/2 "2012-06-28T10:24:15Z")

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When you say “in a chain,” do you mean that you send an email and give it a category, then you get a reply, and you reply to that, and want your reply to automatically be marked with the same category?

No, you are not missing anything. Outlook won’t do this automatically. You can modify your view of your inbox to show threads, but it won’t automatically set all the emails in a thread to a category.

I believe this would require a macro. Macros in Outlook are a bit trickier than Excel or Word because there is no macro recorder in Outlook.

(When asking questions like this please specify what version of the application you are using.)

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**Author:** ![redtail23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/3e96dc/32.png) [@redtail23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/redtail23)\
**Post date:** [June 28, 2012, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outlook-how-to-use-categories/626546/3 "2012-06-28T14:41:11Z")

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You can use the Rules to do this, but you’d have to do it with each email conversation. And if someone changed the subject line or something, it would no longer apply.

If you’d like instructions for this, I can post them if you’ll say what version you’re using.