PST to Microsoft 365 Migration Guide

Introduction

This is the complete onboarding task flow for migrating PST (Portable Storage Table) files into Microsoft 365 mailboxes.

The following requirements for PST files need to be met:

  • PST files need to be in Outlook 2003 (or later) format.
  • PST files cannot be corrupted. We do not offer a solution for automatically fixing corrupted PST files and migrating them. Any corrupted PST files must be fixed before a migration can be performed. 
  • If UploaderWiz is installed: All end users' desktops need to be Windows-based (running at least Windows Vista or later; Mac OS is not supported), have .NET 4.6 installed, and have the ability to run a command prompt as Administrator.

The key difference for PST migrations, when compared to standard mailbox migrations, is that the PST files need to first be discovered and then uploaded to a secure Azure Storage account before they can be migrated into the mailboxes on the Destination, using MigrationWiz.

App passwords are not supported for the Microsoft 365 endpoint. 

First migration?

We’ve created a guide on scoping, planning, and managing the migration process for your use. If this is your first migration, we recommend reading this guide carefully.

For more information on how to set up a project using Azure Storage, read the Azure for MigrationWiz article.

The key difference for PST migrations, when compared to standard mailbox migrations, is that the PST files need to first be discovered and then uploaded to a secure Azure Storage account, before they can be migrated into the mailboxes on the Destination, using MigrationWiz.

MigrationWiz

MigrationWiz is a migration solution (not a synchronization solution) and will NOT propagate updates, deletes, or moves of the items previously migrated in the first migration pass because we do not have “live” monitoring of changes (as with a sync agent) and we cannot handle scenarios such as conflict resolution without user interaction.

MigrationWiz supports the capability to share migration projects across a Workgroup. When the Project Sharing feature is turned on, all Agents besides those who are Inactive can view all migrations projects. For more information, visit Project Sharing in MigrationWiz. 

The maximum file size for migration through MigrationWiz varies by migration type and environment, but may never exceed 60GB.

What items are and are not migrated?

PST Files from your own Azure storage.

Migrated

  • Folders
  • Email
  • Contacts
  • Calendars
  • Tasks
  • Journals
  • Notes

Not migrated

  • Follow Up flags
  • Items located in the root folder of the mailbox

PST BitTitan Storage 

PST Files uploaded to BitTitan Storage using the UploaderWiz tool.

Migrated

  • Folders
  • Email
  • Contacts
  • Calendars
  • Tasks
  • Journals
  • Notes

Prepare the Azure Environment

  1. Estimate Azure storage costs. This step is optional but is useful in providing the customer with upfront storage costs ahead of time.
  2. Buy an Azure subscription, or use the free one-month trial ( this option is only viable if you are performing a very small migration).
  3. Create an Azure storage account. We recommend that you create an Azure Storage Account in the same Microsoft data center as the Destination Microsoft 365 tenant. 
    1. Log in to https://portal.office.com
    2. Goto the Storage account you have created for Migration purpose
      1. Click Access Keys for the access keys need to be entered when creating the Destination endpoint. We recommend that you create an Azure Storage Account in the same Microsoft data center as the Destination Office 365 tenant. 
    3. Take note of the Storage Account Name and the Primary Access Key.
  1. Create an Azure BLOB container. Take note of the name of the BLOB to be entered in the Bucket Name field in the project Advanced Options.

Prepare the Destination Environment

Create the admin account

  1. Create a user in Office 365.
  2. Connect to Exchange Online by using remote PowerShell.
  3. Type the following command, and then press Enter:
    Get-Mailbox -ResultSize unlimited -Filter {(RecipientTypeDetails -eq 'UserMailbox') -and (Alias -ne 'Admin')} | Add-MailboxPermission -User AdministratorAccount@mydomain.com -AccessRights fullaccess -InheritanceType all

After you perform these steps, the specified user will be able to access all user mailboxes in Microsoft 365. The user will be able to view the contents of the mailboxes from either Outlook or Outlook Web App.

Set up accounts in Microsoft 365

  1. Set up accounts on Microsoft 365 and assign licenses. These can be created in several ways:


Modern Authentication Requirements

Exchange Online EWS Modern Authentication Requirements (click on this box to expand required steps)

The steps listed below apply to both the source and/or destination tenant when they are Exchange Online, in regards to Exchange Web Services (EWS) in mailbox, archive mailbox, and public folder projects. Use a Global Administrator for the configuration steps.

 

For setup steps that include images, see under Enabling Modern Authentication for EWS between MigrationWiz and your Exchange Online Tenant in the following KB: Authentication Methods for Microsoft 365 (All Products) Migrations

Important: Failure to perform the steps for your Microsoft 365 endpoints, can result in failed jobs with 401 errors like the following in your project: Http POST request to 'autodiscover-s.outlook.com' failed - 401 Unauthorized


The administrator account being used for the project needs to be excluded from any MFA/2FA policies or Conditional Access policies that can block access for the administrator account. This requirement does not apply to the items or users being migrated in the project.

Configuring Modern Authentication to work with MigrationWiz for mailbox, archive mailbox, and public folder projects in Exchange Online is now the default method after Microsoft discontinued support for Basic Authentication in Exchange Online after December 2022. The following Microsoft documentation outlines this change in more detail. Should you have additional questions on how this change may impact your tenant, please contact Microsoft to assist with providing that information: Deprecation of Basic authentication in Exchange Online

The Azure Security Defaults must also be disabled in the tenant. (This is often enabled by default for all new Exchange Online tenants and there is no workaround for this requirement). For steps on where to enable/disable the Azure Security Defaults, see Enabling security defaults in the following Microsoft documentation. To disable, set Enable Security defaults to No: Security defaults in Azure AD

Modern Authentication Steps
  • Log in to the Azure AD admin console with a Global Administrator login.
  • Select Azure Active Directory in the Azure Active Directory Admin Center.
  • Select App Registrations, which is found under Manage.
  • Select New Registration at the top of the screen.
  • Give the app a distinct name. You can change this later if necessary.
  • Select the Accounts in any organizational directory button.
  • Under Redirect Uri, select Public Client (mobile & desktop) and set it to urn:ietf:wg:oauth:2.0:oob
  • Click Register.
  • Go back to App registrations.
  • Select the App you just created.
  • In the Overview, you will find a ClientId (aka Application) and Directory (Tenant) ID.
  • Copy both of these to another application, such as Notepad, for use later in this process.
  • Under the Manage menu, select Authentication.
  • Set the option Allow public client flows to Yes
  • Click Save.
  • From the Manage menu, select API permissions.
  • If API permission named User.Read under Microsoft Graph is already present, this can be removed. The Microsoft Graph API is not applicable to this project type and is not used.
  • Select Add a Permission.
  • Select APIs my organization uses

  • Scroll down and select Office 365 Exchange Online

  • Then select Delegated Permissions

  • Select EWS

  • Check the box under EWS for EWS.AccessAsUser.All.
  • Click Add permissions. This permission only allows the OAuth application (MigrationWiz) to be associated with EWS.
      • Important: This does not grant access to all mailbox data.
  • Click Grant admin consent.
  • Click Yes to confirm the settings.
  • In MigrationWiz, select the project that needs to be configured for Modern Authentication.
  • Click the Edit Project menu.
  • Select Advanced Options.
  • Under Support Options enter the ClientID and TenantID information you saved earlier in the following format:
    • If enabling Modern Authentication for the Source:
      • ModernAuthClientIdExport=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
      • ModernAuthTenantIdExport=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
    • If enabling Modern Authentication for the Destination:
      • ModernAuthClientIdImport=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
      • ModernAuthTenantIdImport=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx 
        • Enter the specific ClientID and TenantID for your tenant in place of the xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx.
        • These options can be entered for either the Source or the Destination, or both, depending on the settings on the tenants.
        • These options need to be configured for each MigrationWiz project that needs to have Modern Authentication enabled.

  • Run a Verify Credentials to confirm that MigrationWiz can connect using Modern Authentication. 
  • Click on the item that was verified. There will be a message in the MigrationWiz Migration Information page that Modern Authentication is being used. This message will show in the “Migration Errors” box; however, it is not an error. This is just a message confirming that Modern Authentication is now active and being used for the connection.

Prepare the tenant to send & receive large items

We do not impose any limit on item/attachment sizes. However, it is possible for large items/attachments to fail to migrate because of external factors.  There are two considerations:​

  1. What is the maximum attachment size allowed by the Destination system? 
    • Most email systems impose size limits. For example, if the Destination system has a 30MB limit, any item/attachment larger than 30MB will fail to migrate.
  2. What is the connection timeout for the Source and Destination system? 
    • ​​For security reasons, most email systems close opened connections after a predetermined amount of time. For example, if the Destination system only has 512Kbps of network bandwidth and closes connections after 30 seconds, we may be unable to transfer large items/attachments before the connection is closed.

MigrationWiz will automatically make multiple attempts to migrate large items. Upon completion of a migration, you may resubmit it in error retry mode to try to migrate failed items. This is always free of charge.:

When migrating from or to Office 365 use the steps provided here to increase the Max Send and Max Recieve quotas, Change message size limits in Office 365.

Discover PST Files and Upload to Azure

Discover PST files on the network, and upload them into Azure.

MSPComplete Steps

Create Customer

  1. Click the Add button in the top navigation bar.
  2. Click the Add Customer button on the All Customers page.
  3. In the left navigation pane, select the appropriate workgroup and then click All Customers.
  4. Click Add Customer.
  5. Enter the new customer’s information in the Add Customer form. Primary Email Domain and Company Name are required. The rest are optional.
  6. Click Save.
  7. Repeat steps 1 through 4 for each customer you want to add. 

Purchase licenses

We recommend that you purchase the User Migration Bundle license for this migration scenario. User Migration Bundle licenses allow multiple types of migrations to be performed with a single license. They also allow DeploymentPro to be used to configure Outlook email profiles. For questions on licensing, visit MigrationWiz Licenses

To purchase licenses:

  1. Sign in to your BitTitan account. 
  2. In the top navigation bar, click Purchase.
  3. Click the Select button and choose User Migration Bundle licenses.
  4. Enter the number of licenses you want to purchase. Click Buy Now.
  5. Enter a Billing address if applicable.
  6. Click Next.
  7. Review the Order Summary and enter a payment method.
  8. Click Place Your Order.

Apply licenses

  1. Select the correct workgroup on the top of the left navigation pane. This is the workgroup that the customer and migration project were created under. Your account must be part of the workgroup if the project was not created under your account.
  2. On the left navigation pane, click Customers.
  3. Click the customer that employs the user to whom you want to apply a User Migration Bundle license.
  4. Click the Users tab at the top of the page.
  5. Check the box to the left of the email for the user(s) to whom you want to apply a license.
  6. Click the Apply User Migration Bundle License button at the top of the page. It is recommended that users be added to the Customer page with the vanity domain. Then have the User Migration Bundle Licenses applied, before editing to show the .onmicrosoft domain, if the .onmicrosoft domain will be used for the migration.
  7. If there is at least one unassigned User Migration Bundle license available for each selected user, click Confirm. Important: If there are no User Migration Bundle licenses currently available to be assigned and your role in the workgroup is Manager or higher, the form that appears provides all the necessary information and will walk you through the steps of purchasing User Migration Bundle licenses.

MigrationWiz Steps

Create a Personal Archive Migration project

  1. Click the Go to My Projects button.
  2. Click the Create Project button.
  3. Select Personal Archive as the migration type.
  4. Click Next Step.
  5. Enter a Project name and select a Customer.
  6. Click Next Step.

Endpoints

Endpoints are now created through MigrationWiz, rather than through MSPComplete. The steps for this section outline how to create the endpoints in MigrationWiz.

If you are selecting an existing endpoint, keep in mind that only ten endpoints will show in the drop-down. If you have more than ten, you may need to search. Endpoint search is case and character specific. For example, Cust0mer will not show up if the search is customer. We recommend keeping a list of endpoints you have created, along with any unique spellings or capitalization you may have used.

You may either use existing endpoints, or create new ones. 

To create a new source endpoint:

  1. Click Endpoints.
  2. Click Add Endpoint.
  3. Select PST.
  4. Enter Storage Account Name and Access Key in the fields provided. When entering the Azure Storage Account Name for the source endpoint, only numbers and lowercase letters can be used. If you enter an upper case letter, your migration will fail.

To create a new destination endpoint:

  1. Click Endpoints.
  2. Click Add Endpoint.
  3. Enter endpoint name.
  4. For endpoint type, select Office 365.
  5. Fill out required fields.

Add Users

Add the user accounts that will be migrated to the project.

Add Advanced Options

Under Support/Support Options and Advanced Options:

  • Under Source/Bucket Name, set the bucket name to "migrationwiz". If you are using your own Azure storage and uploaded your PST files into a container that has a different name, change the bucket name to "migrationwiz". If the container name and bucket name do not match, you will get an error when trying to import your PST files.
  • Under Destination, choose whether to ingest the PST files into mailboxes or archives.
  • Enable impersonation at Destination by selecting the check box Use impersonation at Destination.
  • Folder Mapping. Folder mapping is optional, but you can control the mapping of folders on the destination by using regular expressions. Read the Folder Filtering & Mapping in MigrationWiz article for more information.
    • Important: By default, MigrationWiz will mirror the folder structure that exists on the Source when migrating to the Destination. When a migration starts and you are taking the default folder mappings (that is, a single folder at the root), MigrationWiz creates the Destination folder based on the item type of the first item migrated. If the first item is a calendar item, then the Destination is mapped to the root of the calendar folder. You can control this by migrating item types in batches (mail items, calendar items, etc.), each item type migrated in a separate migration pass.
  • Set the preferred BitTitan data center. For the fastest migration speeds, select the data center that is closest to your Microsoft 365 Destination tenant. Read the BitTitan - Data Security and Privacy Policy article for more information.
  • Add PSTCustomEndpointSuffix=Azure URI under Support options. This advanced option is only needed when uploading your PST files to a specific Azure data center, using the UploaderWiz optional parameter of azurelocation=gov, ger, or china. The Azure URI needs to be changed to one of these values:
    • chinacloudapi.cn (China)
    • cloudapi.de (Germany)
    • usgovcloudapi.gov (government)

Import PST files

Import PST files into the MigrationWiz PST archive project.

Steps:

  1. Click the Autodiscover Items bar.
  2. Click the Start Autodiscover button.
  3. Once the PST files have been discovered, click the green + Import Items.
  4. If 0 items are discovered, a common mistake is that the Source/Bucket Name under Project Advanced Options has not been set to the correct Azure container name.

Choose destination mailbox

Choose which Destination mailbox to inject each PST file into.

The owner's email address should be displayed under the "Destination Email" column.
If change.me@bittitan.com is displayed as the Destination email address instead of the actual owner's email address, click the Edit Item (pencil icon) to the right of the row. Then, under the Destination Email Address field, enter the mailbox that this file will be ingested into.

If you have multiple PST files to migrate into a single mailbox, click the pencil icon next to the individual migration item. Then, under Source PST Path, click the Add button (the +) to add the additional PST path(s).

Run Verify Credentials

  1. Open the Project containing items you wish to validate​.
  2. Select the items you wish to validate.
  3. Click the Start button in your dashboard.
  4. Select Verify Credentials from the drop-down list.

Once complete, the results of the verification will be shown in the Status section.​ 

Start migration

  1. Select the users.
  2. Click the Start button from the top.
  3. Select Full Migration.
  4. Click Start Migration.

Run Retry Errors

Look through the user list and click any red "failed migration" errors. Review the information and act accordingly.

If problems persist, contact Support.

Post Migration

Optional (does not apply to Microsoft storage): Delete the Azure blob container that was created during the upload to Azure. This will prevent incurring post-migration Azure costs for these containers. Be careful to only delete the container that was created for this migration project.

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