Auto Download Outlook Email Attachment – Code in VBA by Topbullets.com

October 1, 2016 ~ Deepesh Singh

I get some raw data through email every day. Now when I want to do some analysis on the data I need to go through the inbox, search for that particular data and then download it to local. The process is very tedious. Now I am very happy that I have got rid of this manual process. Kudos to Google! I want to share the tutorial with very basic code. One can easily leverage the VBA code to write some complicated criteria and enhance it further. Here I am using snapshots from Outlook 2013 but have tested the feature in 2007 and was working fine. Without talking too much let’s start.

Step 1: Open your Outlook and enable micro.

File>>Option>> Trust Center>> Trust center settings>> Select notification for all macros

TrustCenter

Step 2: Then press Alt+F11 to open VBA. Go to ‘Module’ from left panel or you can add one new one if you don’t see it there.

Step 3: Paste the below code and save it.

Public Sub SaveAutoAttach(item As Outlook.MailItem)

Dim object_attachment As Outlook.Attachment

Dim saveFolder As String
' Folder location when I want to save my file
saveFolder = "D:\Data\Archive"

    For Each object_attachment In item.Attachments
' Criteria to save .doc files only
    If InStr(object_attachment.DisplayName, ".doc") Then

        object_attachment.SaveAsFile saveFolder & "\" & object_attachment.DisplayName

    End If

    Next

End Sub

Step 4: Now Go to Rule>>Manage Rules & Alerts. Please follow below snapshots.

Step 5: Select ‘Apply rule on message I receive’ and Next

Step 6: In this step choose your words sincerely. Right now I am choosing 2nd option. Whatever you select on the first panel you will see them in 2nd panel. Click on ‘Specific word’ circled in the image.

Step 7: Provide the word like “IBM Data” and save it. You can add more words as well.

Step 8: In this step we will select ‘Action’. As we want to run a VBA script, we select ‘run a script’. Again click on ‘run a script’; a pop-up windows may open. Just ‘Enable’ the micros and select the micro which we saved in backend.

Step 9: You are almost done. Save the rule as per your convenience and click ‘Finish’. Select the circled check box if you want to run the script on deleted items otherwise it’s good.

Step 10: Restart your outlook and send some document with subject ‘IBM Data’ and see the magic.

Signature

Deepesh Singh
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23 thoughts on “Auto Download Outlook Email Attachment – Code in VBA by Topbullets.com”

Bharat

September 10, 2018 at 11:05 PM

Hi I have pasted the above code in outlook module & when i setting rule, i am not getting open of “Run a script”.
how can i find it, let me know if there is any option to show it.

Reply
- Anonymous
  
  April 2, 2019 at 1:40 PM
  
  Hi Bharat,
  I am getting the same issue. Did you get a solution?
  
  Reply
- saurav8sg (@vats8sg)
  
  April 2, 2019 at 1:43 PM
  
  Hi Bharat,
  I am facing the same issue. Did you get a solution for the same?
  
  Reply
- Anonymous
  
  July 9, 2019 at 1:03 AM
  
  I ran into the same problem. This link fixed it for me.
  
  https://www.extendoffice.com/documents/outlook/4640-outlook-rule-run-a-script-missing.html
  
  Reply
vivek

November 28, 2018 at 3:22 PM

hi, i was curious on how the code would fit ( InStr ) if you wanted to have it for more than two file extenstions.
Like .xlsx or .pdf along with .doc put in.

Reply
Anonymous

March 16, 2019 at 5:56 PM

This is working pefect – thanks for the posting

Reply
Saurav Vats

April 2, 2019 at 1:39 PM

Hi,
I am not getting the option of run a script in step 8.
What shall I do to correct this issue?

Thanks and Regards
Saurav Vats
email: sauravvats1995@gmail.com

Reply
saurav8sg (@vats8sg)

April 2, 2019 at 1:44 PM

Hi,
I am not able to find the option of run a script (step 8). Can anyone help me with this?

Reply
Anonymous

April 3, 2019 at 11:07 PM

For those of you who don’t see the ‘run a script’ option. Try this: https://www.extendoffice.com/documents/outlook/4640-outlook-rule-run-a-script-missing.html

Reply
- Hiran
  
  April 28, 2022 at 6:15 PM
  
  Thank you so much for instruction auto saving attachments from outlook to specific folder. Such a time saver.
  Just one more thing how can i add several other criteria to same VBA project or create a new project?
  
  Reply
ahmed abdelhafiz

April 11, 2019 at 2:34 PM

very useful code, but i have problem
problem is file send with same file name so old file deleted and replaced by new one.
need to add date for file name
thanks for you

Reply
- Anonymous
  
  May 2, 2019 at 10:06 PM
  
  try this:
  
  Public Sub SaveAutoAttach(item As Outlook.MailItem)
  
  Dim object_attachment As Outlook.Attachment
  
  Dim FileName As String
  
  Dim saveFolder As String
  ‘ Folder location when I want to save my file
  saveFolder = “D:\Data\Archive”
  
  For Each object_attachment In item.Attachments
  ‘ Criteria to save .pdf files only
  If InStr(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”) Then
  
  FileName = Replace(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”, “”)
  
  object_attachment.SaveAsFile saveFolder & “\” & FileName & ” ” & Format(Now(), “DD-MMM-YYYY hh mm AMPM”) & “.pdf”
  
  End If
  
  Next
  
  End Sub
  
  Reply
- RJ
  
  May 2, 2019 at 10:07 PM
  
  Try this:
  
  Public Sub SaveAutoAttach(item As Outlook.MailItem)
  
  Dim object_attachment As Outlook.Attachment
  
  Dim FileName As String
  
  Dim saveFolder As String
  ‘ Folder location when I want to save my file
  saveFolder = “D:\Data\Archive”
  
  For Each object_attachment In item.Attachments
  ‘ Criteria to save .pdf files only
  If InStr(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”) Then
  
  FileName = Replace(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”, “”)
  
  object_attachment.SaveAsFile saveFolder & “\” & FileName & ” ” & Format(Now(), “DD-MMM-YYYY hh mm AMPM”) & “.pdf”
  
  End If
  
  Next
  
  End Sub
  
  Reply
Anonymous

May 2, 2019 at 10:05 PM

Ahmed, i had the same problem. I found that this worked for me:

Public Sub SaveAutoAttach(item As Outlook.MailItem)

Dim object_attachment As Outlook.Attachment

Dim FileName As String

Dim saveFolder As String
‘ Folder location when I want to save my file
saveFolder = “D:\Data\Archive”

For Each object_attachment In item.Attachments
‘ Criteria to save .pdf files only
If InStr(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”) Then

FileName = Replace(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”, “”)

object_attachment.SaveAsFile saveFolder & “\” & FileName & ” ” & Format(Now(), “DD-MMM-YYYY hh mm AMPM”) & “.pdf”

End If

Next

End Sub

Reply
Nana

September 3, 2019 at 1:33 PM

How if the attachment is in hyperlink in outlook body email?

Reply
Anonymous

September 9, 2019 at 6:09 PM

Hi, how would i get the script to download more than one attachment?

Reply
Anonymous

October 11, 2019 at 9:03 PM

NOT WORKING

Reply
Pranjal

October 18, 2019 at 5:48 PM

In Step 8 :
After clicking on ‘a script’ , Not Able to see saved VBA script in “Select a script” Option.
Plz help…!!!

Reply
santosh

January 22, 2021 at 10:31 AM

Hi how to do this in excel 2007

Reply
Madhur

May 9, 2021 at 10:16 PM

its not working for me. DO we need to go to tool and add any reference ?

Reply
Anonymous

June 18, 2021 at 8:58 PM

amazing stuff

Reply
Anonymous

June 18, 2021 at 9:13 PM

When using this it keeps telling me “object required” anyone else getting that error?

Reply
Anonymous

December 23, 2021 at 10:05 PM

Edited to save the file with the date that was sent on the file.

Public Sub SaveAutoAttach(item As Outlook.MailItem)

Dim object_attachment As Outlook.Attachment

Dim FileName As String

Dim saveFolder As String
‘ Folder location when I want to save my file
saveFolder = “D:\Data\Archive\”

For Each object_attachment In item.Attachments
‘ Criteria to save .pdf files only
If InStr(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”) Then

FileName = Replace(object_attachment.DisplayName, “.pdf”, “”)

object_attachment.SaveAsFile saveFolder & “\” & FileName & ” ” & Format(item.SentOn(), “YYYY-MM-DD hh.mm AMPM”) & “.pdf”

End If

Next

End Sub

Reply