How to move your old emails to a new email provider

By the Olvane team · Updated November 12, 2026

Changing email providers is easy. Bringing years of old messages with you is the part people worry about. The reliable way is to export your mailbox to a file from your current app, then import that file into the new provider.

This guide shows how to export from each common app, which file format you'll get, and the mistakes that cause missing emails.

Which format does your app export?

Before you export: make sure everything is downloaded

This is the step that catches most people. Desktop email apps often keep only recent mail on your computer and leave older messages on the server. An export may then contain only what's stored locally.

In classic Outlook for Windows, for Microsoft 365 or Exchange accounts, go to File → Account Settings → Account Settings, double-click the account, and move the Download email for the past slider to All. Restart Outlook and wait until the status bar says all folders are up to date. Only then export. If your export seems to stop at a certain date, this setting is the usual reason.

Also check your archive: Outlook can move old mail into separate archive files or an online archive, which a normal export of the mailbox doesn't include. Export those separately.

Outlook for Windows: export a PST file

1. Open File → Open & Export → Import/Export.
2. Choose Export to a file, then Outlook Data File (.pst).
3. Select the top of the mailbox (your email address), and tick Include subfolders.
4. Choose where to save the file. You can skip the optional password.

The new Outlook for Windows doesn't offer PST export. Switch back to classic Outlook with the toggle at the top of the window, or install it, to export.

Outlook for Mac: export an OLM file

1. Choose File → Export (or Tools → Export in older versions).
2. Select Mail and continue.
3. Save the .olm file.

Apple Mail: export MBOX

1. Select a mailbox in the sidebar.
2. Choose Mailbox → Export Mailbox and pick a folder.
3. Repeat for each mailbox you want to keep. Zip the exported folders together to upload them in one go.

Gmail: Google Takeout

1. Go to Google Takeout and click Deselect all.
2. Tick Mail, then create the export.
3. Google emails you a download link, sometimes after several hours for large mailboxes. The archive contains an MBOX file with all your mail; Gmail labels appear in a header on each message.

Thunderbird

Install the free ImportExportTools NG add-on, right-click a folder, and export it as MBOX or as individual EML files. Thunderbird also stores each local folder as an MBOX file in your profile directory, which you can copy directly.

Importing into the new provider

How you import depends on the provider. Some only accept mail copied over IMAP, which means adding both accounts to a desktop app and dragging folders across, which is slow and easy to interrupt for large mailboxes. Others accept the exported file directly.

With Olvane, open the mailbox, choose Import, and upload a PST, OLM, MBOX, EML or ZIP file. The import runs on the server, so you can close the page. It keeps your folder structure, maps Inbox, Sent, Drafts and Deleted Items to the right folders, and skips messages that are already there, so running the same import twice won't create duplicates. You can also export any mailbox as MBOX or EML at any time.

After the import

• Spot-check a few folders, including your oldest messages, before closing the old account.
• Compare message counts for large folders between the old app and the new mailbox.
• Keep the export file somewhere safe. It's a complete backup of your mailbox at that date.

Moving the domain too? See getting a professional email address for the DNS side of the switch.