Choosing the best option for your Office 365 migration can be challenging, but in this short guide, we’ll outline some best practice advice when moving from different versions of Exchange Server.
Thankfully, it’s possible to migrate all mailbox data (email, contacts, tasks and calendar items) with a variety of pathways, dependent upon business needs.
If you’re migrating from Exchange 2003 or 2007 and don’t want to add an Exchange 2010 or higher server to your infrastructure as a Hybrid server, study the following methods:
| No. of mailboxes | Timeframe | Method to choose |
| < 150 | Weekend, or over a few days | Cutover migration |
| < 150 | No urgency, moving a few users at a time | Staged migration For 150+ mailboxes, the preferred option is a staged migration, batching a limited number of mailboxes into waves. |
| 150+ | Weekend, or over a few days | Staged migration To learn more. see Office 365 migration batches: How to Group and Wave Users |
| 150+ | No urgency, moving a few users at a time | Staged migration |
When migrating from Exchange 2010, 2013 or 2016, the following approaches will be most suitable:
| No. of mailboxes | Timeframe | Method to choose |
| < 150 | Weekend, or over a few days | Cutover migration or Express migration |
| < 150 | No urgency, moving a few users at a time | Exchange Hybrid To learn how to perform this process, download our detailed guide: How to Migrate Exchange to Office 365: Step by Step |
| 150+ | Weekend, or over a few days | Exchange Hybrid
|
| 150+ | No urgency, moving a few users at a time | Exchange Hybrid |
If you work for a large organization that has thousands of users and mailboxes, and a large volume of archive data, you may be interested in our ‘fixed-cost, fixed-outcome’ managed migration services that can quickly and efficiently upgrade your entire email ecosystem to Office 365.
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If you’re planning an Office 365 migration and would like to discuss how we can help, please contact us today and one of our expert team will be in touch.
