How to recover mailboxes in Exchange Server 2019?

Read time 6 minutes

Even the latest Exchange Server versions like Exchange 2019 is not completely secure; data loss can happen due to manual errors like accidental deletion, EDB corruption, and access problems in Exchange Server. However, when a mailbox is deleted, it can be restored from Exchange 2019 database it is retained for some time. Because of the Exchange retention policy, mailbox which is deleted remains in the database till the expiry of the retention period (by default 30 days, which you can also set as per your needs). Once this period is over, the deleted mailbox will be removed permanently.

How to recover a mailbox from Exchange 2019 after its deletion?

You can restore the Exchange 2019 mailbox using the Connect a mailbox option in Exchange Admin Center. You can connect the deleted mailbox to an existing user account (which is not associated with any other mailbox) or to a new user account. Then, you can connect the mailbox as follows:

1. Go to Recipients > Mailboxes in EAC and click More…; now, click Connect a mailbox.
2. When the list of the disconnected mailboxes is displayed, click the mailbox that you want to restore and click Connect.
3. Click Yes to confirm the action.
4. When the list of user accounts is displayed, just select the one that you want and click OK.

The deleted mailbox gets connected to the user account.

You can connect the disconnected mailboxes using the Management Shell cmdlet also. To do that, you can use these cmdlets:

Note: You can use the Get-User cmdlet to find the mailbox you want to connect.

However, these methods do not guarantee success if the Exchange database is corrupt or inaccessible. In that case, you need professional Exchange EDB recovery tool. Kernel for Exchange Server efficiently recovers any kind of inaccessible Exchange data from corrupted Exchange databases and make it available for preview. Here, we have given the necessary steps for the recovery of lost Exchange 2019 mailboxes via the software.

It is advised to dismount the Exchange database first so that offline EDB file is available for mailbox recovery. Then, visit the software web page and download the trial version if you have not bought it already. After the installation of the tool on your system, launch it, and follow these steps.

1. On the start screen, either click Add Source or Offline EDB to add Exchange 2019 EDB file. In the new window, the Offline EDB file is selected by default, click Next to continue.
   
2. Now, browse and add the offline EDB file as source. If you don’t know the EDB file location, you can use the Search option to search for the EDB files in the specified drive; click Next.
   
3. Choose a suitable scanning mode and click Next.
   
4. All the EDB mailboxes, whether deleted, lost or disconnected, are available for preview. You can select any mailbox folder and preview its content. Now, add destination by clicking either Add Destination or PST File option as displayed here.
   
5. You have different options for conversion to PST – you can either save data to a new PST file or to an existing one. Choose your option (here Create New PST File) and click Next.
   
6. You need to provide a path location to save the PST file. This PST file can also be protected with a password if needed. Click Next.
   
7. After adding both the source and destination, select any source folder and right-click on it. You can choose from the listed options like Copy Folder, Extract Attachments, Export Message(s), etc.
   
   Note: You can also export all the mailboxes to pst directly by selecting Export Mailboxes to PST after placing the cursor at the root folder.
8. After you have selected Copy Folder option from the source pane, go to the destination pane and right-click on any folder. Now select Paste Folder option.
   
9. A list of options and filters will be available for selective saving. Make your choices and click OK. The saving process will start and complete quickly, and you can see the pasted content in the destination pane.

Thus, Exchange mailbox recovery has been completed.

Ending Words

The accidental deletion of mailboxes is a cause of data loss in different versions of Exchange Server, including Exchange 2019. However, deleted mailbox recovery is easy as Exchange retains mailboxes for some time before the permanent deletion. We have mentioned some methods for deleted mailbox recovery with Exchange Admin Center and Exchange Management Shell. It is also recommended for mailbox recovery in any Exchange data loss situation.