Moving mailboxes between a hosting plan and the Professional E-mail plan

Backups & Migration·· 29 views· 3 min read

The short answer: moving mailboxes from a hosting plan to the Professional E-mail plan (or the other way round) keeps the addresses, but changes where the mail is stored. So it goes in order: create the mailboxes in the new service, copy the messages, switch where the domain's mail goes and, last, update the devices. Talk to us before you start, so we can agree a time for the switch.

Why people move

From To Usual reason
E-mail on a hosting plan Professional E-mail plan The website is moving elsewhere, the team has grown, or you want mail separate from the site
Professional E-mail plan E-mail on a hosting plan Bringing everything into one service, with the website

The differences between the two options are in e-mail inside a hosting plan or a separate e-mail plan.

The move, step by step

1 Order the destination service and open a support ticket saying you are moving the mailboxes. Give the domain and how many mailboxes there are.
2 Create the mailboxes in the new service, with the same names and quotas big enough for what they already hold.
3 Copy the messages. With a few mailboxes, an e-mail program with both accounts on IMAP lets you drag folders across. With many, we agree the copy with you: see the migration page and how mailbox copying works.
4 Switch where the domain's mail goes (the MX records) to the new service, at the agreed time.
5 On the hosting plan that keeps only the website, cPanel must know mail is no longer there: under Email Routing, choose the remote mail exchanger. Otherwise, e-mails your own website sends to your mailbox get stuck on the old server: Email Routing in cPanel.
6 Update the devices with the new service's passwords and run a second copy for messages that reached the old service during the switch.
7 Only at the end, once everything comes in and goes out, delete the old mailboxes.
Do not delete the old mailboxes on day one. While the record change spreads across the internet, some servers still deliver to the old destination. Leave them until you are sure nothing else arrives, and copy whatever did.
The server name on devices does not change: it is still mail.yourcompany.com. What may change is the password, if you created the new mailboxes with new passwords. Warn the team first, so nobody thinks the mailbox is broken.

Moving mailboxes from one plan to the other? Open a ticket and we will plan the switch with you.

Open a support ticket

SEE ALSO

E-mail inside a hosting plan or a separate professional e-mail plan

The Professional E-mail plan

Copying mailboxes with imapsync: how it works and what to prepare

Email Routing in cPanel: local, remote or automatic, and the mail that vanishes

MX records in depth: priority, several mail servers and the mistakes that lose e-mail

Bringing your mailboxes from another provider: the messages, not just the addresses

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