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Many organizations are in the process of migrating their Exchange Server data to Office 365 to avoid maintenance expenses of the on-premises server. However, there are other reasons to migrate to Office 365; the extensive features and security of Office 365 make it attractive for businesses to migrate their data.
Once you have decided to migrate your data, the next step is choosing the type of Exchange to Office 365 migration. You can perform three types of methods to migrate your Exchange Server 2016 to Office 365 – Staged, Cutover, and Hybrid migrations. Each of these migration methods has its own peculiarities and processes. Furthermore, each of these methods is used based on a business’s migration requirements.
This article explains the step-by-step process of the hybrid migration method for migrating Exchange Server 2016 data to Office 365 or Microsoft 365.
Hybrid migration is a type of migration method used for migrating hybrid environment data. In hybrid migration, it is presumed some data is stored in the server and the rest in the cloud. Besides, performing hybrid migration is a bit challenging as compared to other migration methods.
There are two types of hybrid migration you can perform to migrate your Exchange Server 2016 data – Minimal and Full Hybrid migration. As cutover migration is familiar to all Exchange users, it often leads to a discussion on office 365 cutover vs minimal hybrid migration. If you’re planning to migrate mailboxes from on-premises Exchange 2016 to Office 365, using the minimal hybrid migration approach is recommended, as it is easy to set up. On the other hand, the full hybrid migration method does provide additional features but is hard to execute. Also, full hybrid migration takes longer to migrate the data.
The hybrid migration approach ensures smooth migration of data with minimal interruption for your business. Here, we will describe the step-by-step process of migrating Exchange Server 2016 data to Office 365.
The minimal hybrid migration is useful in the following scenarios:
We have created a step-by-step process to help you migrate your Exchange 2016 data to Office 365. Each of these steps must be followed in the same manner to migrate your data without any errors.
However, if the verification fails, wait for a few minutes and try again. Move to the next step once the domain is verified.
Now, click Update on the Ready for Update page to prepare the on-premises mailboxes for migration.
Once the synchronization is finished, you’ll be redirected to the Data Migration page, where all the synchronized users are listed.
Note: After the one-time synchronization of users, the directory synchronization turns off automatically in Office 365.
After synchronizing the users with your Office 365, you need to assign licenses to each user so that they can access their cloud mailboxes once the data is migrated. On the data migration page, you’ll notice the ‘license required’ status in front of each mailbox, as shown below:
To give license to users, go to the admin center >> user. Click Active users to add users individually or in bulk.
Note: Before migrating the entire mailboxes, it is recommended to migrate two or three mailboxes to check the migration process flow.
When you start migrating the mailboxes, the Data Migration page will display the migration status as it progresses, as shown below:
You can update DNS records.
The minimal hybrid migration works perfectly when the on-premises Exchange server has everything in place, which means there shouldn’t be any corrupted databases. However, you cannot migrate public folders within the above process; you need to perform a separate migration process for it. Besides, if the migration fails for any reason, you’ll have to create new migration jobs every time to migrate the data, which could be time-consuming and costly.
So, what is the best way to quickly migrate on-premises Exchange mailboxes to Office 365 without any hassle or data loss?
It is advisable to use a third-party tool like Kernel Migrator for Exchange, which allows you to perform On-premises Exchange to Office 365 Migration quickly without going through a complicated process. Kernel Migrator for Exchange is an intelligent exchange migration tool specially designed to migrate single/multiple mailboxes from Exchange environments. It is integrated with smart features like selective data migration, migration scheduling, zero downtime, data synchronization, and more.
It follows a unique approach to migrate the Exchange mailboxes quickly to Office 365. It even allows you to migrate public folders within the same migration job. After finishing the migration, it also provides you with real-time reports of your migration.
Exchange Server 2016 on-premises to Office 365 migration has become very common for organizations, as everyone wants to avail the extensive features of the cloud and save money. But, the migration process is not that easy, as it involves complicated steps, especially if you choose the hybrid migration process. This article highlights the step-by-step process of migrating your Exchange on-premises mailboxes to Office 365 with the hybrid migration method. It also talks about an automated solution that can eliminate the hassles of manual Exchange to Office 365 migration.