Multiple Organizations have their on-Premises Exchange setup for maintaining their data, mailboxes, communication system, and much more. The exchange allows controlling the data, but its maintenance cost is one reason behind the migration towards cloud-based service. However, after Office 365 came into existence, many business entities looked for the Exchange to Office 365 migration. Still, many of them stopped migration in between due to a lack of support and knowledge.
Office 365 migration from Exchange on-premises is itself a daunting task, and there is no room for making a mistake as it will derail the migration. If we look into the reasons for the migration, then the Exchange maintenance cost and manual requirement for the environment gradation are some of them.
We have prepared this technical guide to explain to you different reasons, manual solutions, and third-party reliable Exchange to Office 365 migration tools to make the task easier for all.
Why users looking to switch to Office 365 from Exchange
Various reasons behind the user motive to change their emailing platform from Exchange to Office 365. Some of the top ones we have listed in the below section:
- Microsoft Office 365 is a cost-effective platform as you need to invest any amount while paying the upfront fees. Users need to pay only for the subscription model they have opted for. Office 365 offers multiple monthly subscription plans, which vary with the allowed storage limit.
- Maintaining the complete setup of the Exchange server demands more resources and is time-consuming. Moreover, Exchange can have downtime, which stays for a longer time. At the same time, users have access to their Office 365 data at all times.
- Users will get multiple inbuilt applications like Skype for business, Yammer, Microsoft Team, and many more in Office 365.
- Exchange saves its complete data in the EDB files, which are prone to corruption which is also one of the reasons for migration.
- Users will not need to think about the up gradation part as Microsoft will release the update, which will automatically be reflected in the user account.
Having such reasons, insist on going for Office 365 migration from the Exchange environment.
However, it will take a lot of work, and the user needs to go with procedures like fulfilling the prerequisites, migration requirements, etc. Any user who doesn’t have the required migration skills and does with the IT experts' support is requested to stay away from the manual Exchange to Office 365 migration solution.
How to move Exchange mailboxes into Office 365 environment?
There’s a lot that needs to keep in mind while selecting the migration approach. Some of them are the total number of accounts to be moved, the size of the items inside the account, financial & time constraints, and many more.
Users can choose any manual migration approach according to their needs, including Staged, Cutover, and Hybrid migration. You can select any one from them depending upon the requirement to move a number of mailboxes. First, we will talk about the staged migration, and later on, we will discuss the remaining ones.
Staged Exchange to Office 365 Migration
Using this Exchange to Office 365 migration approach is recommended if you have 2000 or more mailboxes. The migration will be done in stages over a period of time. Follow the below-mentioned procedure to migrate your Exchange mailboxes using Staged migration.
- The first step user needs to take while approaching this method is to synchronize all mailboxes with Office 365 using AD Sync.
- Generation of the list includes the required number of mailboxes for migration in the CSV file format.
- Preparation of batches in order to start the migration of the active account of the Exchange into Office 365.
- Start the batch migration of the required number of mailboxes.
- Repeat the last two steps explained above to verify the staged migration.
The process will take a couple of days as the migration will be done in a staged manner. It will also depend upon another parameter, such as the total size of the mailboxes.
This migration method has several drawbacks, such as the user should have adequate knowledge of the multiple procedures involved in this migration method.
It is a time-consuming process, and a single error while performing the migration will result in data loss. So please make sure to keep all things in mind while utilizing this method.
Cutover Migration to move Exchange mailboxes into Office 365
This is another method to move the Exchange accounts into Office 365. You can utilize this Exchange to Office 365 migration option when the number of mailboxes is limited. Users can move their complete organization mailboxes if they have up to 2000 mailboxes because this method migrates mailboxes more than its limit.
In this Office 365 migration from Exchange method, all mailboxes will be moved simultaneously, but it is advisable to migrate only 150 mailboxes at once to avoid the chance of migration failure.
Hybrid Migration to move Exchange On-Premise Mailboxes into Office 365
Before you start migrating mailboxes, you must ensure a hybrid deployment between the On-Premises Exchange Server and Office 365. This procedure is suitable for large organizations with experts to take care of the migration. You also don’t need to create a new mailbox request but make sure to create a coexistence between Exchange & Office 365.
Above mentioned manual migration approaches consume a lot of time, are difficult to execute, and have chances of data loss due to a single mistake. So it will be good to have another option which we will update you on in the following section.
Quick Method to manage the migration of mailboxes from Exchange into Office 365
We have gone through some manual solutions that help an organization complete its migration. However, the Exchange to Office 365 method takes too much time, and an admin responsible for moving mailboxes needs to be technically strong enough to do their job successfully.
If you don’t have enough time left and want to reduce the chances of data loss, then you can use third-party Software. Shoviv Exchange to Office 365 migration tool is an advanced solution that helps move multiple mailboxes without restricting their sizes into Office 365. This software allows users to save their mailboxes into PST files. Also, it is capable to migrate public folders to Office 365 efficiently.
Compared to manual migration, this tool is easier to use due to its intuitive interface. It also lets users move only the selective data using the tool filter option. The tools make sure to restrict the duplicate item, and if users use its incremental option before executing the migration, then it will resume the halted process and migrate only the new item. Setting up this Exchange to Office 365 migration tool is much easier and will be done in a few minutes. Moreover, users can try out its free demo version to check on its functionality.
Wrapping Up
Moving with a cloud-based service from the on-premises Exchange server is a wise choice. However, the important thing that users should remember is the selection of the appropriate Exchange to Office 365 migration method. The solution we have discussed in this guide will assist you to migrate mailboxes into Office 365 smoothly. But not all users will find it comfortable to use a manual solution. If you want the migration straightforward, you can directly use the third-party software discussed above. Otherwise, you can choose the manual method as a solution to migrate into Office 365.
