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Email Migration: How to Migrate Your Emails with Zero Downtime

 . Email Migration How To  . Email Migration: How to Migrate Your Emails with Zero Downtime

Migrating emails from one account to another is a task dreaded by most email users and sys admins alike. The reasons are obvious: When manually migrating emails, it is likely that data gets lost, folders or drafts are forgotten, duplicated emails are received or – worst of all – downtime occurs. In this guide, we’ll cover how to prevent downfalls like these by relying on the right preparation, aftercare and using an email migration software.

What are the advantages of using a email migration software like MailJerry or email migration service compared to manually transferring emails?

  • You prevent data chaos as you do not have to configure two email addresses in your email client and manually drag and drop your data from one mailbox to the other.

  • All your emails and folders are copied to their new destination, including drafts and sent objects.

  • When migrating lots of data or performing an email migration from a slow server, it might take several hours until all your data is received in your new inbox. When transferring your data manually, you cannot use your email client in the meantime. Through using an email migration service, you can write and send emails during the migration, without having to worry about crashes or data chaos.

  • Email migration tools like MailJerry migrate emails as a background tasks, which means that you experience zero downtime.

  • You can synchronize your email accounts after the email migration to ensure that your mailboxes stay synced.

  • You see exactly how many emails and folder are migrated to your new mailbox and therefore ensure that all your data was received.

Does email migration work with all email providers?

Yes, of course. As long as you’re using IMAP, which means that your email data is stored on a mailserver and not on your local computer or mobile device, you can migrate emails independently from the utilized email provider.

For example, with MailJerry, you can easily:

  • migrate from Gmail to Office 365

  • migrate emails to Gmail

  • migrate emails to Office 365

  • migrate emails from G Suite to Microsoft Outlook

  • migrate emails from or to Godaddy

  • and many more…

So, what do you need to do to start your email migration?

Step 01: Get Ready for Your E Mail Migration

In order to migrate your emails to another provider or to a new account, you most importantly need two things:

1) The credentials / access data of your old email account.
2) The credentials / access data of the email account you want to migrate your data to.

What parts does your email access data consist of?

Your email credentials consist of the following parts:

  • your username (e.g. edwardexample@example.com or just edwardexample)

  • your password

  • the name / address of your mailserver (e.g. mail.gmail.com or mail.example.com)

  • optionally additional information like port numbers and encryption method

Which parts of the access data do you need to migrate your emails?

In most cases, it is sufficient to know your username, password and the address of your mailserver. If the username of your mailbox is the same as your email address (e.g. example@mailjerry.com), you might even not need the name of the mailserver. The MailJerry email migration tool automatically guesses the name of your mailserver after you entered your email address in the field “Username”.

If a connection is possible, everything is good to go. In case the email migration software cannot establish a connection to your mailbox, you need to enter the name of your mailserver and, in some cases, the port and encryption method.

Email migration: Complete guide with setup and migration instructions

Where do you find the access data for your email address?

Normally, you should have received a document or email with your access data and the settings for your mailbox (mailserver, encryption etc.) after you signed up for your current and old email account.

If you lost (or never received) such a document, it might be helpful to check the settings of your email client (e.g. Apple Mail, Outlook…). If your email address is configured in your email client, you can check the settings to see your username and the address of the mailserver.

Otherwise, you can always request the data from your email provider and – in case you don’t remember your password – reset the password for your email account. But be careful if you reset your password: If you’re utilizing an email client on your computer and/or smartphone, you have to exchange the old password in the settings of your devices email client(s) as well.

Step 02: Start the Email Migration

Your email migration with the email migration tool “MailJerry” consists of three simple parts. In case you are using another email migration software (which we are, of course, not recommending :wink: ), the process usually works similar (however, probably not as smooth, reliable and fast… :slight_smile: ).

Part 1: Enter the credentials for your old account

Download & open MailJerry and start a new migration:

Select the account type (IMAP, Gmail, Yahoo!… – select IMAP if insure) and enter the credentials of your old email account. This is the account that currently contains your data and from which you wish to migrate your email data from.

Part 2: Enter the email credentials for your new account

Select the account type and enter the credentials of your new account into the email migration tool. This is the account receiving your emails.

IMAP to IMAP Migration: Add Credentials

Part 3: Start the email migration

After you entered your credentials, click on “Check Settings”.

The email migration tool now checks if a connection to your new and your old email account is possible. In case a connection to your mailbox was rejected by your email server, the MailJerry migration service provides you with detailed instructions and tips on how to fix this issue. Usually, you only have to thick off some checkboxes in the settings of your email account and you are good to go.

After a connection to both email accounts was established, the email migration software shows a summary of the email transfer: The summary contains the amount of emails to be migrated, the data volume that has to be transferred and the exakt number of folders that are transferred to their new destination. Now, it’s time to start the email migration through clicking on “Start Migration”.

IMAP to IMAP Migration: In Progress

Depending on the data volume and the speed of your old and new mailserver, the email migration might take some time. While the mailbox migration is running, you can migrate your contacts and (if needed) your calendar:

Step 03: Export / Import Your Contacts During the E Mail Migration

While your email migration is running, it’s time to export your contacts and import them into your new mailbox. If you’re switching email providers, you might have to export your contact list and import the email contacts into your new account. If your contacts are synced by your operation system or if you are using a cloud service (e.g. iCloud), it might be possible that you do not have to migrate your contacts at all.

Usually, you’ll find the option to export your email contacts in the contacts page of your email client, the contacts app or in the settings of your email account. Here’s how to export your email contacts for the most popular email clients:

Migrate Gmail Account: Export Contacts
https://support.google.com/contacts/answer/7199294?hl=en

Migrate Gmail Accounts: Import Contacts
https://support.google.com/contacts/answer/1069522?hl=en

Migrate Emails from or to Apple Mail: Export Contacts
https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/export-or-archive-contacts-adrbdcfd32e6/mac

Migrate Emails from or to Apple Mail: Import Contacts
https://support.apple.com/guide/contacts/import-contacts-adrbk1457/mac

Migrate Emails from or to Outlook 365 on a PC: Export Contacts
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/export-contacts-from-outlook-10f09abd-643c-4495-bb80-543714eca73f

Migrate Emails from or to Outlook 365 on a PC: Import Contacts
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/import-contacts-to-outlook-bb796340-b58a-46c1-90c7-b549b8f3c5f8

Migrate Emails from or to Yahoo! Mail: Export Contacts
https://www.lifewire.com/export-yahoo-address-book-1174479

Migrate Emails from or to Yahoo! Mail: Import Contacts
https://www.lifewire.com/import-contacts-to-yahoo-1174494

Step 04: Export / Import Calendar

In case you are using a calendar connected with your mailbox that is not synced by your OS or a cloud service, it’s necessary to export your calendar as well. Exporting calendars is usually quite easy and can be done in the calendar settings.

Here are a few tutorials for exporting and importing calendar events that might be helpful for everyone who is in the process of performing an email migration with MailJerry or another email migration software or email migration service:

Migrate Gmail Account: Export Calendar
https://support.google.com/calendar/answer/10041132?hl=en

Migrate Gmail Accounts: Import Calendar
https://support.google.com/calendar/answer/37118?hl=EN

Migrate Emails from or to Apple Mail: Export and Import Calendar
https://support.apple.com/guide/calendar/import-or-export-calendars-icl1023/mac

Migrate Emails from or to Outlook 365 on a PC: Export Calendar
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/export-an-outlook-calendar-to-google-calendar-662fa3bb-0794-4b18-add8-9968b665f4e6

Migrate Emails from or to Outlook 365 on a PC: Import Calendar
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/import-or-subscribe-to-a-calendar-in-outlook-on-the-web-503ffaf6-7b86-44fe-8dd6-8099d95f38df

Migrate Emails from or to Yahoo! Mail: Export and Import Calendar using iCal
https://www.lifewire.com/set-up-yahoo-calendar-ical-sync-11707600

Done: After the Email Migration

After your e mail migration is completed, do not forget the following steps:

Sync your emails after the email migration:

If your old mailbox is still receiving emails after the email migration, activate the email sync in the MailJerry mailbox migration tool. Through activating the sync option for your email transfer, the software will automatically copy all emails received in your old account to your new email account. Therefore, you do not have to worry about lost emails while being in the transition between two email providers.

Tell important contacts your new email address:

In case your email address changed, do not forget to inform your contacts about your new email address. Usually, it is sufficient to email people which whom you are regularly in contact.

Add an autoresponder to your old account:

When migrating email mailboxes, there is usually someone you forget to inform about your new email address (or who simply did not read your email with your new contact details). In this case, it makes sense to add an autoresponder to your old account informing the sender about your new email address.

Delete your old account after some time:

When your old account is not receiving any new emails and all your contact are informed about your new email address, do not forget to delete your old email account after some time.

As you’ve seen, email migration with an email migration tool like MailJerry is easy and nothing you have to procrastinate about :slight_smile:.

 


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