Migrate multiple mailboxes to Office 365 with EdbMails

EdbMails provides a user-friendly solution for migrating multiple mailboxes to Office 365. Its advanced features, including concurrent mailbox migration, automatic Office 365 throttling management, incremental migration, and automatic mailbox mapping, ensure a seamless migration from your source mailbox account to the target mailbox account.

What is Multiple Mailbox Migration?

Office 365 multiple mailbox migration is the systematic process of migrating multiple mailboxes, including Primary mailboxes, Public folders, Archive mailboxes, Emails, Calendars, Contacts, and related data, from Office 365 to on-premises Exchange Server mailboxes, IMAP-enabled mailboxes, or when consolidating multiple Office 365 tenants into a single, unified environment. Using EdbMails for this purpose enables you to perform parallel migrations, making it easier to migrate all your organization's mailboxes quickly. In other words, EdbMails is a highly efficient application that significantly enhances mailbox migration performance.

We'll explore the key features that EdbMails Office 365 migration software offers and how the software simplifies the multiple mailbox migration operation.

1. Multiple Office 365 mailbox migration - Pre-migration activities

   On source Office 365 server:

   • Make sure you have a Global Admin account with a mailbox for Auto Registration of the EdbMails application on your Entra ID (Azure Active Directory). For Manual Registration, you can use either a Global Admin account or a user account with full access permissions.
   • Ensure that your network and bandwidth meet the requirements for the migration.

      See network and migration planning, performance factors and best practices for Office 365 to Exchange migration.

   On target Exchange server:

   Step 1: Check that your system meets the Exchange server setup requirements.

   Navigate through the below links to set up your target Exchange server environment based on the Exchange version you want to migrate to. Learn more about the network, hardware and operating system requirements for installing Exchange server.

   • Exchange 2013 Server setup
   • Network and directory requirement for Exchange 2016
   • Network and directory requirement for Exchange 2019
   • Hardware Requirements for Exchange 2016
   • Hardware Requirements for Exchange 2019
   • Supported operating systems for Exchange 2016
   • Supported operating systems for Exchange 2019

   Step 2: Prepare your target server with the following prerequisites

   Complete the following prerequisites for Active Directory, Windows Mailbox server, and Windows Edge Transport servers before installing the Exchange server.

   • Exchange 2019 prerequisites for preparing Active Directory (AD)
   • Windows Server prerequisites for Exchange 2019
   • Exchange 2016 prerequisites for preparing Active Directory (AD)
   • Windows Server prerequisites for Exchange 2016

   Step 3: Set up Exchange Server for migration

   Given below is a list of key points for installing and preparing the Exchange server for migration.

   1. Prepare AD and domains

      Before installing Exchange Server you need to prepare your Active Directory forest and its domains for the new version of Exchange.

      If you have a separate team to manage the Active Directory schema, you need to first extend the active directory schema, else proceed to the next step to prepare the Active Directory.

      If you have multiple domains you need to additionally prepare the Active Directory domains.

   2. Install Exchange server on your computer

      Before installing the Exchange server, ensure that you meet the system requirements and prerequisites as outlined previously. Next, follow the link to install Exchange 2016 or install Exchange 2019 from the setup wizard.

   3. Prepare a clean Exchange target environment
      • Create and configure a Send connector to send mail outside the Exchange organization.
      • By default, Exchange automatically creates receive connectors for inbound mail flow when the mailbox server is installed. If you need to configure receive connectors, follow the steps in the link.
      • Add accepted domains to allow recipients to send and receive email from another domain.
      • Configure the default email address policy to add the accepted domain to every recipient in the organization.
      • Configure external URLs (domains) on the virtual directories in the Client Access (frontend) services on the Mailbox server to allow clients to connect to your server from the internet (outside the organization’s network).
      • Configure internal URLs on the virtual directories in the Client Access (frontend) services on the Mailbox server to allow clients to connect to your server from the internal network.
      • Configure SSL certificates from a third-party certificate authority for services such as Outlook Anywhere and Exchange ActiveSync.
      • Verify the Exchange server installation by running the command Get-ExchangeServer on the Exchange Management Shell (EMS).

   4. Verify the mailbox of the admin account

      Check to see if the admin account that has been assigned management roles has a valid and non-hidden mailbox on the Exchange server.

   5. Settings related to throttling and message-size limits

      • If Microsoft throttles the migration, change the EWS throttling settings on Exchange server.
      • If the migration is stuck due to the large size of a message, set the message size limits to the maximum on the Exchange server.

2. Step-by-step guide for Office 365 multiple mailbox migration with EdbMails

   In this guide, we'll walk you through the process of migrating multiple mailboxes to Office 365 using EdbMails Whether you're migrating from the same domain or different domain, this step-by-step approach ensures a seamless migration experience with the software. From initial setup and data migration to monitoring progress, this guide will cover all the essential steps for a successful Office 365 mailbox migration.

   • Step 1: Download and Install EdbMails application

     • Download and install EdbMails software on your system
     • Click ‘Login’ or ‘Start Your Free Trial’ to get started with EdbMails.
     • Check system requirements for Office 365 migration.

       

   • Step 2: Select Office 365 to Office 365 migration option

     • Select the 'Office 365 Migration' option

       

     • Select ‘Office 365 to Office 365 Migration’.

       

     • Keep the default job name, or click ‘New Job’ button to change the job name.

   • Step 3: Connect to source Office 365 server

     • Click ‘Add New Connection’ to set up a new link to the source Office 365 account. To reuse an existing setup, choose it from the list and click ‘Connect to Existing’.
     • Choose the required connection options and click the ‘Next’ button.

       

     • Select one of the secure OAuth 2.0-based modern authentication methods and authenticate Microsoft sign in page
     • Click the ‘Login’ button to continue.

       

     • After authentication, select a method to load mailboxes or use a CSV file to import them for migration.
     • Select the multiple mailboxes you want to migrate from the source Office 365 server.
     • Click ‘Next’ to proceed.

       

   • Step 4: Select Office 365 Mailboxes

     • Click ‘Add New Connection’ to connect to the target Office 365. To reuse a saved connection, select it from the list and click ‘Connect to Existing’.
     • Choose the desired connection options and click ‘Next’ to continue.

       

     • Choose the appropriate target connection method and authenticate on Microsoft sign-in page.
     • Click the ‘Login’ button to continue.

       

     • Choose the one of the methods to load all mailboxes.

   • Step 5: Map source and target mailboxes

     • Choose the required mailbox mapping option
     • Once mailboxes are created on the target server, EdbMails automatically maps mailboxes and folders between source and target tenants. You can manually map folders and subfolders to specific target folders.

       

   • Step 6: Start multiple Office 365 mailboxes migration

     • Click ‘Start Migration’ to begin the migration process.
     • EdbMails will start the migration automatically and notify you when it's finished. Click ‘View Logs’ to check the migration report. You can also pause or resume the process as needed.

       

3. Post migration activities

   Step 1: Update the MX records to point to Office 365

   First, add your domain to Office 365. If you haven’t updated DNS records before, modify the MX records to ensure emails are properly routed to Office 365. Additionally, configure the Autodiscover record to allow Outlook to connect to the migrated mailboxes.

   Step 2: Clear the Auto-Complete list in Outlook

    See manage suggested recipients with Auto-Complete.

   Step 3: Create a new Outlook profile after migration

   • Ensure each user has the latest Outlook version installed to avoid compatibility issues.
   • Set up Outlook profiles for each user in your domain if they experience connectivity problems with Office 365 mailboxes.
   • Configure Outlook with the new server settings, including server address, username, and password.
   • Test email functionality to confirm that users can send and receive emails successfully.

   Step 4: Remove the old Office 365 subscription plan

   Once the migration is complete and you have confirmed the integrity of the migrated mailbox data, proceed to remove the Office 365 subscription plan from the source tenant, along with any associated domains.

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Additional Resources:

• Migrate between Office 365 tenants
• Migrate Office 365 mailbox
• Public folder migration
• Office 365 to Exchange Migration
• Office 365 Migration with same Domain