Complete a task

When you have completed a task or no longer need to follow up on an item, you can mark it complete. After it is marked complete, it will no longer display as an active task in Microsoft Outlook.

What do you want to do?

Mark a task complete

Skip an occurrence of a recurring task

End recurrence of a task

Mark a task complete

Do any of the following:

• Click the flag status column in the message list, in Tasks, in the To-Do Bar, or in the Daily Task List in Calendar    

  • Click the flag status column beside the item.

• Right-click the task in Tasks, in the To-Do Bar, or in the Daily Task List in Calendar    

  1. Right-click the task.

  2. Click Mark Complete on the shortcut menu.

• Double-click the task in Tasks    

  1. Double-click the task to open it.

  2. In the % Complete box, enter 100%.

     The Status and % Complete fields are linked. If you change the value in one field, the value in the other field also changes, according to the values in the following table.

Status	% Complete
Not Started	0
In Progress	1-99
Completed	100
Waiting on someone else	0-100
Deferred	0-100

Note: If the Complete field appears in the task list — as a column of check boxes headed by a check mark — you can select the check box for the task to mark it complete. If the Status field appears in the task list, you can click Completed in the drop-down list for the task.

• Open an e-mail message marked with the task flag    

  1. Open the e-mail message.

  2. On the Message tab, in the Tracking group, click .

     Keyboard shortcut  ALT-U

  3. Click Mark Complete.

     Click here to learn the difference between Mark Complete and Clear Flag

     Mark Complete     The item remains marked with a follow-up flag, but it is now displayed with a strikethrough. If the To-Do Bar or Tasks is configured to show all tasks and to-do items regardless of whether or not they are complete, you will continue to see the message until you delete it from your mail folders.

     Clear Flag     The flag is removed from the e-mail message, and there is no record of the message ever appearing in the To-Do Bar and Tasks.

     If you want to keep a record of completed items, use Flag Complete. However, once you delete the e-mail message, the entire item will completely disappear from all Outlook views.

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Skip an occurrence of a recurring task

1. Open the specific occurrence that you want to skip.

2. On the Task tab, in the Options group, click Skip Occurrence.

Note: If you set the recurring task to end after a specified number of occurrences, each occurrence you skip reduces the number of remaining occurrences by one.

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End recurrence of a task

1. Open the recurring task.

2. On the Task tab, in the Options group, click Recurrence.

3. Click Remove Recurrence.

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