Where are you moving from?

The method depends on what you use now:

  • Google Workspace (Gmail with your own domain): Microsoft has a built-in Google Workspace migration that copies email, calendars and contacts.
  • Email from your web host, domain company or an old internet provider: usually an IMAP migration, which copies email only. Calendars and contacts are exported and imported separately.
  • A personal @gmail.com or similar address: that address cannot be moved, because it belongs to Google. You get a new address on your own domain, copy the old emails across, and set the old account to forward new mail for a while.

Step 1: Take stock

Before touching anything, write down:

  • Every mailbox, with roughly how big it is.
  • Every alias and shared address, such as info@ or sales@, and who reads them.
  • Anything else that sends email as your domain, such as your website contact form, booking system or accounting software.
  • Where your domain's DNS is managed, and that you can log in there.
  • Every device that has email set up: PCs, laptops, phones and tablets.

Check where the DNS is hosted. If your old email provider also controls your DNS, make sure you can still manage it after you cancel their email service.

Step 2: Lower the DNS TTL

A day or two before the switch, lower the TTL (time to live) on your MX record to around 5 to 15 minutes, if your DNS host allows it. This makes the change take effect faster on the day.

Step 3: Prepare Microsoft 365

Set up the new account and add your domain, as in how to set up Microsoft 365. Verify the domain with the TXT record, create a user for each person and a shared mailbox for each shared address. Do not change the MX record yet. Email keeps arriving at the old provider while you copy it.

Step 4: Copy the old email

From Google Workspace:

  1. In the Exchange admin centre at admin.exchange.microsoft.com, go to Migration and choose Add migration batch.
  2. Choose Migration to Exchange Online, then Google Workspace (Gmail) migration.
  3. Follow the wizard. It asks you to set up access in your Google account, which it can mostly do for you, and to upload a CSV listing the mailboxes to move.
  4. Start the batch. Email, calendars and contacts copy in the background while everyone keeps working.

From another host by IMAP:

  1. Find your old provider's IMAP server name, for example mail.yourhost.co.uk.
  2. Create a CSV with three columns, EmailAddress, UserName and Password, one row per mailbox.
  3. In the Exchange admin centre, choose Add migration batch, Migration to Exchange Online, then IMAP migration, and upload the CSV.
  4. Start the batch. Export calendars and contacts from the old system and import them into Outlook separately.

For one or two mailboxes, adding both accounts to classic Outlook and dragging folders across also works, though it is slower.

The CSV for an IMAP migration contains passwords. Store it carefully, delete it afterwards, and ask people to change their old passwords once the move is done.

Step 5: Switch over

When the first copy has finished, pick a quiet time, such as Friday evening, and:

  1. Change the MX record to the one Microsoft gives you, and remove the old MX records.
  2. Add the autodiscover CNAME.
  3. Update the SPF record so it includes Microsoft 365, plus any other services that still send as you.
  4. Wait for new emails to start arriving in Microsoft 365. With a low TTL this is usually within the hour.
  5. Run a final sync of the migration batch to catch anything that arrived at the old provider during the change.

Step 6: Reconnect devices

On each PC, set Outlook up with the new account, or create a new Outlook profile if the old account was set up there. On phones, remove the old email account and add the work account to the Outlook app. Then set up MFA for everyone, see setting up MFA, and switch on DKIM and DMARC, see SPF, DKIM and DMARC.

Step 7: Do not cancel the old service straight away

Keep the old email service running for a few weeks. It is a safety net if something was missed, and some senders may cache the old MX record for a while. Once you are sure everything is across, cancel it. Check whether your domain registration is bundled with it before you do.

Common problems

  • The website contact form stops delivering, because it was sending through the old provider. Update its settings or add it to SPF.
  • Phones still checking the old account, so people think email has stopped.
  • Shared addresses forgotten in the plan, so info@ bounces after the switch.
  • Very large mailboxes taking longer than expected. Start the copy days ahead.

RoamTech moves small businesses to Microsoft 365 from Google, web hosts and other providers, remotely, anywhere in the UK, and supplies the licences as a Microsoft partner and reseller. Google Workspace licences are bought directly from Google. RoamTech is not a Google reseller. See Microsoft 365 setup and support or remote IT support.