A lot of Items in Top of information store of archive mailbox

Question

Hello,

one of my users in Exchange Online has a pretty big mailbox & associated in-place archive. Mailbox has about 50% space free out of 100gb (plan 2 license). In-Place Archive is autoexpanding…until it isnt anymore. It currently sits at 129/130gb and won’t autoexpand anymore. What I’ve noticed is that A LOT of data is in Top of information store of the ARCHIVE mailbox:

Name : Top of Information Store FolderAndSubfolderSize : 55.91 GB (60,035,652,593 bytes) ItemsInFolderAndSubfolders : 119510 FolderId : (redacted) FolderPath : /Top of Information Store

Probably due to a botched bulk import. I have offline archives so I don’t worry about deleting things, but simple question is how do I even delete items from Top of Information store?

I have tried running a ComplianceSearch on that folderid, but only got about 2 GBs of unindexed items.

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

you're dealing with quite a mess in the "Top of Information Store" in your Exchange Online archive mailbox. With the auto-expansion hitting a wall and the huge amount of data, it’s understandable that you’d want to clean things up.

Here's a step-by-step approach that might help:

1. Check the Situation

First things first, make sure you have a backup of all the important data from the mailbox, just in case anything goes wrong. It’s always better to be safe.

2. Find Out What's Eating Up Space

Look into what’s actually filling up that “Top of Information Store” folder. Are there huge attachments or lots of old emails? Sometimes it’s helpful to see what types of items are taking up the most space.

3. Run a Content Search

You can use the Microsoft 365 compliance center or PowerShell to find large items or unwanted content:

1. Create a Search: If you’re using PowerShell, you can run something like:

      powershellCopy code
      New-ComplianceSearch -Name "LargeItemsSearch" -ExchangeLocation <UserMailbox> -ContentMatchQuery 'size:>50MB'
   

   This helps you locate items over a certain size. Review and Delete: After running the search, you can decide which items to delete. Be careful here—double-check that you’re not removing anything crucial.

      powershellCopy code
      Start-ComplianceSearchAction -Identity <SearchName> -Purge
   

   This command will permanently delete the items identified by your search.
2. Use PowerShell for Direct Cleanup

If you’re comfortable with PowerShell, you can connect to the archive mailbox and start managing items directly:

Connect to Exchange Online:

powershellCopy code
Connect-ExchangeOnline -UserPrincipalName <AdminUser>

Search and Remove Items:

powershellCopy code
Search-Mailbox -Identity <UserMailbox> -SearchQuery 'folderid:<FolderId>' -TargetMailbox <AdminMailbox> -TargetFolder <Folder> -LogLevel Full

You might use this to find and move items or delete them.

Example to delete items:

powershellCopy code
Search-Mailbox -Identity <UserMailbox> -SearchQuery 'folderid:<FolderId> AND Received:<Date>' -DeleteContent

Adjust the search query to fit what you’re looking for.

5. Consider Moving Items

If deleting isn't an option and you still need to free up space, think about moving old or less important items to a different folder or mailbox messages like your texas benefits

Export and Move:

powershellCopy code
New-MailboxExportRequest -Mailbox <UserMailbox> -FilePath "\\server\share\export.pst"

This lets you export the data and then you can clean up as needed.

Manual Cleanup:

Sometimes using Outlook or Outlook Web Access to manually move or delete items can be simpler.

6. Prevent Future Issues

Monitor Regularly:

Set up alerts or regularly check mailbox sizes to avoid hitting the limit again.

Adjust Policies:

Review and tweak your archiving policies so they better manage growth and avoid auto-expansion issues.

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I hope this helps you get a handle on the situation!.

Answer 2

Hi，

Thanks for posting your question in the Microsoft Q&A forum.

According to your description, you used ComplianceSearch to search, but the results were not satisfactory.

I suggest you first find the document ID in the Top of Information Store and then search for it using New-ComplianceSearch.

If my answer is helpful to you, please mark it as the answer so that other users can refer to it. Thank you for your support and understanding.