How to Backup PST From Office 365?

Microsoft Office 365 is one of the leading business suite in the market – offers great business applications, email applications, generous storage, security, and much more. This attracts more and more organizations/users to adopt Microsoft services.

However, it provides complete security features but does not provide backup of the files. This is why many organization looks for ways to backup PST from Office 365 so that they can have the backup with them.

Why Backup is Required?

Office 365 does not provide any inbuilt tool to backup emails from Office 365. Here the user needs to go for the manual method which is to be carried by oneself.

Reasons to backup PST From Office 365 are as follows:

1. Backup Office 365 emails locally: Office 365 provides the complete security features however it is always better to keep a backup of the mailboxes. There might be some possibility of misshapen or uncertainty. In such a situation the data go at risk. To prevent such a scenario, it is always better to keep a backup.
2. Generate More Space: It is necessary to clear the mails in Office 365 only after keeping a backup. The sufficient space in the mailboxes would not hinder the send/receive of emails.

How to Backup PST From Office 365 Account?

To backup Office 365 account, there can be two methods to do so. The first method is the manual method and the second method is using the automated tool.

Firstly, we will discuss the manual method and learn about the steps involved in backup PST from Office 365.

The following are the steps to backup PST from Office 365:

1. Sign in the Office Account online with the administrator credentials.

2. Afterwards, go to Admin and then Exchange.

3. On the left pane of the page, click on ‘Permissions’. Go to ‘Admin Roles’ and then click on ‘Discovery Management’.

4. In the ‘Discovery Management’, click on the ‘+’ sign to add roles.

5. Under the roles, you can click on ‘Mailbox Import/Export’.

6. Under the category ‘Members’, click on the ‘+’ sign again and then click on the name of the user.

7. Once the necessary steps have been completed then click on the ‘Save’ option.

8. Move to ‘Compliance Management’ then ‘in-place e-Discovery & hold’. Then, click on the new ‘+’ sign.

9. In the ‘In-place e-Discovery & Hold’ dialogue box, type the name and then click on the ‘Next’ button.

10. You can now choose all the mailboxes by clicking on ‘Search all mailboxes’ or the selected ones by ‘Specify mailboxes to search’ option and then click on’+’sign.

11. You can now set the filters and click on the ‘Next button to move further.

12. The next dialogue box that appears is ‘In-Place Hold Settings’. Here you can specify the number of days for which the mail items can be kept. This needs to be specified before they are deleted from the server.

13. Once done then click on ‘Finish’.

14. Click on the ‘Close’ button after the confirmation message appears on the screen.

15. Now lastly all the generated search files appear. After the completion of the process, you can now click on the downward arrow to back up the PST files.

Limitations of manual method

1. Manual Method is quite lengthy in nature and therefore demands a lot of time.

2. There is no possibility of simultaneous backup of all the folders in batches such as emails, calendars, contacts, etc.

3. There is no filter feature to backup the selective emails in the local hard drive.

4. The manual method requires technical expertise. A normal user would find it difficult to use such a method to work with.

Easy Way to Backup Multiple Office 365 Account Emails

If the traditional discovery method is too difficult for you to operate, or if you find complications with it, then it’s better to rely on automated utilities. SysTools Office 365 Export Tool is a useful and efficient automated tool that permits to export of Office 365 mailboxes to PST file format.

The following are the relevance of the automated tool:

1. It helps to extract the Office mailboxes to PST file type without any hassle.

2. By using the tool, the simultaneous backup of emails, calendars, contacts, etc., is possible from Office 365 account.

3. The options such as the date and category filter helps to sort the data accordingly and then backup them easily.

4. Backup of multiple user’s data is possible using Admin impersonation in one go.

5. Backup report is generated at the end and it allows to save the data in CSV format.

6. It is adaptive with all the Windows Operating Systems.

Major reasons to avoid the traditional approach

1. In order to use the service of e-Discovery in Office 365, the user account should have Discovery Management role group permission.

2. If the user is working on internet explorer and does not have .Net Framework 4.5 then, the download of the e-Discovery tool would be difficult.

3. The In-Place Discovery tool fails to show the searched contact easily. This becomes difficult in the case of a large volume of data.

Benefits of Choosing Automated Method Over Manual Method

1. In order to extract the files from Office 365 mailboxes, the software requires only Administrator or User Account credentials.

2. The software can be easily downloaded using any browser like google chrome, internet explorer, Mozilla Firefox, etc.

3. The Office 365 mailboxes can be easily downloaded in PST, EML, or MSG format.

4. The resultant file thus created whether, in the formats like PST, EML or MSG are error-free. They can be imported into its supportive email client application.

5. The users can select the folders as per their choice and backup them in the local hard drive in the desired format.

Final Thoughts

In the above blog, you have learned about the different methods for backup PST from Office 365. After careful analysis, it can be said that the manual method is lengthy and cumbersome.

It requires a technical expert to complete the process. Whereas automated tool is very helpful and can easily carry out the backup process. A non-technical user can also perform it and get the best results.