Delete all emails from a Hotmail folder

As you'll learn in the next tutorial, the Hotmail Deleted items folder and Junk folder (or "Spam" folder) both include a special "Empty Folder" command you can use; but for most folders, deleting all email messages contained inside a selected folder is a two-step process, which we'll explain now: (for special ones, see how to empty folders in Hotmail). This tutorial shows you two ways to delete email messages inside a particular folder: one screen at a time to avoid accidents, or delete all emails at once.

Empty a Hotmail folder from all email messages it contains

First, go to the Hotmail folder from which you want to delete all emails, by clicking on its name of the left hand side of the screen: as soon as you do, Windows Live Hotmail will load the content of the folder in question, and display all its messages:
Open the Hotmail folder whose email messages you want deleted

Notice the two green arrows in the screenshot above: the first one shows how you can tell which email folder is currently selected - depending on your Hotmail theme, the background behind its name will be highlighted in one color or another.

The second green arrow points to the "email page navigation" controls for which you need to watch: unlike the "empty folder" command, deleting all email messages from a folder will only apply to emails that are currently visible - in other words, if you have a lot of emails to delete inside a particular folder, you may need to repeat the deletion steps a few times.

Delete all messages, one screen at a time

If you want to delete all messages inside a Hotmail folder, but also want to have a glance at the emails you are about to delete, scroll inside the current screen of emails to ensure that you don't want to keep any of these messages; then, after optionally moving messages you don't want to delete to another folder, click on the "Select All" checkbox as shown below, and click on the "Delete" button at the top:
Select all emails in the Hotmail folder and click Delete

Delete all emails at the same time from the current Hotmail folder

Now that you have loaded the email folder whose messages you want deleted, click on the "Sweep" menu, and choose "Empty this folder":
Delete all Hotmail email messages through "Empty this Folder"

To prevent accidental deletions, Windows Live Hotmail will first display a final confirmation message: "You're about to delete all of the messages in this folder".
Hotmail confirmation message before deleting all emails

Click "OK" to proceed and delete all email messages inside the folder, or click "Cancel" to abort. Once you click on the OK button, Hotmail will move all emails inside that folder to the "Deleted" items folder, from where you can restore these emails if needed. Once you empty the Trash folder ("Deleted" items), these email messages will be permanently deleted.