Saturday, August 20, 2016

Import Gmail to Outlook

When you switch to Office 365 email from another service such as Gmail (or Yahoo! or AOL) you can bring your old email with you and manage it in Outlook. This way, you can have all of your email—past and present—in one place. There isn't a one-click button to import your Gmail, but the desktop version of Outlook has a wizard that will walk you through the steps. How to get Outlook for your desktop.

Before you import email

  • Have your Office 365 user id and password handy.
  • Install Outlook on your desktop (it comes with most Office 365 plans). 
  • Add your Office 365 mailbox to Outlook
TIP: Don't have Office 365? And you want to keep Gmail as your service? You can still use Outlook to read, write, and manage your email. Just perform Step 1: Prepare Gmail for connecting to Outlook and then Step 2: Add your Gmail account to Outlook.

Step 1: Prepare Gmail for connecting to Outlook

Before you connect your Gmail account and Outlook, you need to prepare your Gmail account. You'll need to turn on 2-step verification for Gmail and then create a password that Office 365 will use with your Gmail address to make the connection.

Step 2: Add your Gmail account to Outlook

When you're finished with this step, you'll see your existing Gmail messages in Outlook. You can use Outlook to receive, read, and send new messages from your Gmail account. You can also continue to use your Gmail account as before through the Gmail web site.
  1. Open Outlook on your desktop (such as Outlook 2010, 2013, or 2016). The top ribbon looks like this, with File in the left corner:
    This is what the Outlook desktop ribbon looks like.
    You can only use a version of Outlook that has File in the left corner - it means your version has an Import/Export wizard.
    If your Outlook ribbon looks something like the one below, then you're not using a desktop version of Outlook. This is what the Outlook web ribbon looks like.
  2. In Outlook on your desktop, choose File > Add Account.
    To add a gmail account to Outlook, click the Add Account button
  3. On the Auto Account Setup page, enter your name, your Gmail address and your Gmail password, and then choose Next.
    Enter your gmail email address and your gmail account password
  4. Click Finish. Outlook syncs with your Gmail account. The email in your Gmail account will appear in Outlook, right below your Office 365 mailbox.
  5. After you add your gmail account, you will see two accounts in Outlook

Step 3: Copy your Gmail messages to your desktop

When you're finished with this step, a copy of your Gmail messages will be stored in a file that Outlook creates on your desktop. The file is called an Outlook Data File (.pst). If you receive more email to your Gmail account after you take this snapshot, those additional messages won't be copied to your .pst file, but you can always repeat these steps to copy them.
  1. In Outlook on your desktop (Outlook 2013 or Outlook 2016), choose File > Open & Export > Import/Export.
    To create your Outlook pst file, choose File, choose Open and Export, and then Import/Export
  2. Choose Export to a file, and then choose Next.
    Choose Export to a file
  3. Choose Outlook Data File (.pst), and then choose Next.
    Choose Outlook Data File (.pst) and then choose Next
  4. Select the account you want to export by choosing the name or email address of your Gmail account, and verify theInclude subfolders box is checked (this ensures all your email is copied), and then choose Next.
    Choose the name of your gmail account you want to import
  5. Choose Browse to select where to save the Outlook Data File (.pst) and to enter a file name. By default, the name is "backup," so choose another name that's easy to remember, such as gmail. If you are exporting to an existing Outlook Data File (.pst), under Options, specify what to do when exporting items that already exist in the file. Choose Finish to continue.
    Browse to the location where you want to create the pst file that will store your Gmail messages, and type a name for the pst file.
  6. In the Add an optional password dialog box, add a password if you want. Choose OK to save the data file even if you leave the password boxes empty. Without further notice, Outlook begins exporting the data immediately. It doesn't give you a message when it's done, either.
    When you create a pst file, click Ok even if you don't want to assign a password to it
  7. Go to the location where you saved the .pst file to confirm it's there.

Step 4: Copy your Gmail to your Office 365 mailbox

When you're finished with this step, the email in the .pst file will be available in your Office 365 mailbox.
  1. In Outlook on your desktop (Outlook 2013 or Outlook 2016), choose File > Open & Export > Import/Export to start the Import and Export Wizard.
  2. Choose Import from another program or file > Next.
    Choose to import email from another program or file
  3. Choose Outlook Data File (.pst) > Next.
    Choose to import an Outlook Data File (.pst)
  4. Browse to the .pst file you created in Step 3 (in our example the file is named gmail.pst). Under Options, choose how you want to deal with duplicates. Choose Next.
    Select the pst file you created so you can import it.
  5. If you assigned a password to the Outlook Data File (.pst), enter the password > OK.
  6. Choose to import the email into your Office 365 mailbox (in the example, the Office 365 mailbox is named Jakob@onmicrosoft.com). Choose Finish.
    Choose Finish to import the Outlook pst file to your Office 365 mailbox.
  7. Outlook starts copying the information from the .pst file to your Office 365 mailbox. If you have lots of data, this may take hours. If you shut down Outlook or disconnect from the Internet before the import completes, it will continue the next time it's reconnected.
    When Outlook is finished, you'll see the snapshot of your Gmail, now stored in your Office 365 mailbox. Congratulations! Your old Gmail messages are now in your Office 365 mailbox!
    After you import the email to your Office 365 mailbox, it will appear in two places.
    Because your old Gmail is stored in your Office 365 mailbox, you can use Outlook on the web to access those email messages from any device.
    After you import email from the pst file, it will appear in OWA too

(Optional) Step 5: Remove your Gmail account from Outlook

When you're finished with this step, your Gmail account will still exist, but you won't see it in Outlook. If you receive any more emails at that Gmail account, you'll need to repeat the steps in this article if you want them in your Office 365 mailbox.
  1. In Outlook, choose File > Account Settings > Account Settings.
    To remove your Gmail account, choose File, Account Settings, Account Settings.
  2. In the Account Settings box, select your Gmail account, and then choose Remove.
    Choose the Gmail account you want to remove, and then choose Remove.
  3. In the dialog box about the offline cache being deleted, choose Yes.
    When you remove your gmail account from Outlook, click Yes at the warning about your offline cache being deleted.
    The Gmail messages that you imported to your Office 365 mailbox are still there, but your Gmail account no longer appears in Outlook.

Fixing problems with adding a Gmail account to Outlook

Here are 3 common problems customers experience when importing Gmail to Outlook.
Problem 1: If you get the following prompt, choose Cancel (it will take a couple of times), and then choose Cancel again at the Auto Account Setup page so the prompt stops appearing.
If you get this dialog box, choose Cancel.
This prompt occurs because Google thinks someone besides you has your password. It will display this prompt repeatedly, each time Outlook pings Google. This happens if:
  • You typed the wrong password. To fix, doublecheck your password.
  • Or, you're using a computer that you haven't used before to sign into your Gmail account.
  • Or, you haven't signed in to your Gmail account for a while.
To fix, try this:
  1. Sign in to your Gmail account using the same computer you're going to use for the Add account process.
  2. Make sure you've done the steps to prepare your Gmail account.
  3. Start Step 2: Add your Gmail account to Outlook again, starting at step 3, File > Add account.
Problem 2: If, instead of seeing your Gmail messages in Outlook, you get an error message along the lines of "Your IMAP server wants to alert you to the following......" go to your Gmail account and check that Allow less secure settings has been set to ON, and then do the steps again to add your Gmail account to Outlook.
If you get the error message "Your IMAP server wants to alert you to the following" check that you've set Gmail less secure settings to Turn on so Outlook can access your messages.
Problem 3: You get the error message "Could not complete the operation because the service provider does not support it." Are you trying to import your Gmail messages into an Outlook.com or Hotmail.com account? This error is the result of trying to import into an Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) account. The EAS service provider (Outlook.com / Hotmail) does not support importing (or moving), only copying into the folder. 
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