as an admin I want to restore deleted mail from a mailbox

Question

coworker deleted all mail from its mail box and I wan to restore

Answer 1

Hi Henk

If Recover deleted items is greyed out in the Exchange Admin Center, this usually means your admin account does not have the required Exchange permission yet.

Please check the following:

1. Go to Exchange Admin Center
2. Go to Roles > Admin roles
3. Open or create a role group, for example Discovery Management or a custom role group
4. Add the permission/role:

      Mailbox Import Export
   

5. Add your admin account as a member of that role group
6. Save the changes
7. Wait some time, then sign out and sign back in to the Exchange Admin Center

The Mailbox Import Export RBAC role is required to search for and recover deleted mailbox items. Microsoft Q&A threads also note that, after assigning the role, the permission can take some time to apply before the option becomes available

After the permission has applied, try again:

Exchange Admin Center > Recipients > Mailboxes > select the user > Others > Recover deleted items
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If the option is still greyed out, try a different browser or an InPrivate/InPrivate window, as the admin center can sometimes cache old permissions.

Also note that recovery is only possible if the deleted items are still within the deleted item retention period, or if the mailbox is protected by retention, Litigation Hold, or another backup/retention solution.

Best regards,

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Answer 2

Exchange Admin Center > Recipients > Mailboxes > Select the user > Others > Recover deleted items

tje last function, recover deleted items is grey insteat of black, so i can't get in :-(

Answer 3

Hi,

As an administrator, you may still be able to recover the deleted emails, depending on where they are in the deletion process and whether the applicable retention period has not yet expired.

To help narrow this down, you can check the following options:

1/ Check the user's Deleted Items folder:

First, please verify whether the messages are still located in the user's Deleted Items folder. If the emails were deleted in the normal way, they should remain there and can simply be moved back to the Inbox or any other folder as needed.

2/ Use the "Recover Deleted Items" feature:

If the Deleted Items folder has already been emptied, the messages may still be recoverable through the Recover Deleted Items feature in Outlook or Outlook on the web.

The user, or an administrator with the appropriate access, can open this recovery area and restore any available messages that have not yet been permanently removed from the mailbox.

3/ Recover deleted messages from the Exchange admin center:

In Exchange Online, administrators can also recover deleted mailbox items, provided that the deleted item retention period has not expired.

To do this, navigate to:

Exchange Admin Center > Recipients > Mailboxes > Select the user > Others > Recover deleted items

From there, you can search for, select, and restore the required messages. Microsoft also provides detailed guidance on this process in its documentation: Recover deleted messages in a user's mailbox in Exchange Online.

4/ If the mailbox itself was deleted:

On the other hand, if the entire user account or mailbox was deleted, a different recovery process will be required. In many Exchange Online scenarios, soft-deleted mailboxes can still be restored within the retention period, which is commonly up to 30 days, although this may vary depending on how the mailbox was removed.

It's also worth noting that if the deleted item retention period has already expired, and there is no Litigation Hold, retention policy, or backup solution in place, the emails may unfortunately no longer be recoverable.

I hope this information helps point you in the right direction. If you're able to share any additional details or provide an update on what you've tried so far, I'd be happy to assist further and help explore the available recovery options.

I look forward to hearing from you.

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