How to Migrate Your Email From Microsoft 365 to ZIPROF Professional Email Hosting

Moving your email away from Microsoft 365 takes a bit of planning, but it does not have to be risky. The safest approach is to set up your new mailboxes first, copy your existing mail across, and only point your domain's MX records to ZIPROF once everything is ready. This way your email keeps working the whole time, with no gap where mail goes missing.

Before You Start

Write down every mailbox you currently use on Microsoft 365, for example [email protected] and [email protected]. You will recreate each one on your ZIPROF hosting account before you touch any DNS records.

Plan the cutover for a quiet time, such as a weekend or evening. Some incoming mail can still arrive at your old Microsoft 365 mailboxes for a short while after you change your MX records, so it helps to keep traffic low during the switch.

Step 1: Create Matching Mailboxes on Your ZIPROF Hosting

Create one email account on your hosting for every mailbox you currently use on Microsoft 365, using the exact same addresses.

In cPanel

1. Log in to cPanel and open Email Accounts.
2. Click Create.
3. Enter the same username (the part before the @) as your Microsoft 365 mailbox, set a password, and click Create.
4. Repeat for every mailbox on your domain.

In DirectAdmin

1. Log in to DirectAdmin and open Email Accounts.
2. Click Create Mail Account.
3. Enter the same username as your Microsoft 365 mailbox, set a password, and click Create.
4. Repeat for every mailbox on your domain.

Step 2: Copy Your Existing Mail Across

Since your domain's MX records still point to Microsoft 365 at this stage, you can connect to both the old and new mailboxes at the same time in a desktop email client and copy messages across folder by folder.

1. Add your Microsoft 365 mailbox to a desktop client such as Outlook or Thunderbird using its existing settings.
2. Add your new ZIPROF mailbox to the same client as a second account, using the IMAP settings for your hosting. Your mail server hostname is in your ZIPROF welcome email and on the Email Accounts page in cPanel or DirectAdmin.
3. Select the folders you want to keep from the Microsoft 365 account, such as Inbox, Sent, and any custom folders, then drag and drop them onto the matching folders in the new ZIPROF account.

For a handful of mailboxes this manual copy is straightforward and only needs to be done once per account. If you have many mailboxes or very large ones, a developer can speed this up with an IMAP migration tool instead of copying folders by hand.

Step 3: Point Your MX Records to ZIPROF

Once every mailbox has its mail copied over, update your domain's MX records so new mail starts arriving at ZIPROF instead of Microsoft 365. Your ZIPROF welcome email lists the exact MX values to enter.

DNS changes do not take effect everywhere at once, so expect a short window where some incoming mail still reaches Microsoft 365 rather than your new mailboxes. See how long DNS changes take to propagate for what to expect during this window.

Step 4: Update Your Email Apps on Every Device

After the MX records have switched over, update the mail settings on your phone, laptop, and any other device to use your new ZIPROF mailbox instead of the Microsoft 365 one. Otherwise you may keep checking an inbox that no longer receives new mail.

Step 5: Keep Microsoft 365 Active for a Few More Days

Do not cancel your Microsoft 365 subscription right away. Keep it active for about a week after the cutover in case a sender's system is still using cached DNS results and delivers a message to the old address during that time.

If you would rather have this handled for you, ZIPROF's professional email hosting team can walk through the migration with you from start to finish.