Migrating emails from Outlook to Mac

On May 26, 2008, in Mac, by Anuj Gakhar

I was trying to transfer all my emails (keeping the folder structure intact) from Outlook (on Windows) to Mac. I decided to go with Thunderbird as my email client on Mac (the 3 contestants were Mail, Entourage and Thunderbird).

To my surprise, it was not the most straight forward thing to transfer emails over (as I had thought). Apparently, Mail (email program on Mac) needs mbox files and you cant convert your .pst files easily to mbox files. There are a few apps out there that would do this for you but they are all paid ones. I didnt think it was worth it to pay for something so simple. After looking at a few options, the one I found to be the easiest was this :-

1) Install Thunderbird on your Windows machine and import email/settings/addresses etc from MS Outlook into Thunderbird. (might take a while if you have lots of emails,  took me about 20 mins to do this)

2) Copy the Thunderbird profile to a USB stick or drive.

3) Copy the profile on to your Mac and then if you prefer to use Mail , you can import the Thunderbird profile into Mail or if you prefer to use Thunderbird ( like I did ), you can just replace your default profile folder with the ones that you just copied over. Or you can restore the backed up profile. There is a program called Mozbackup which can backup and restore profiles for you and you wont have to bother about knowing where the profile is etc but unfortunately it only works for Windows. So, would work only for a Windows to Windows transfer.

Thats it, you should be done.  I found this to be the easiest and cheapest way to transfer emails over, I might be wrong though.

Anyone got any better ideas ?

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4 Responses to Migrating emails from Outlook to Mac

  1. bbrice says:

    Try using PST Converter Pro. I found it easier and more reliable than thunderbird path. See here http://www.pstconverterpro.com

  2. Bill Melody says:

    Hello BBrice,
    For nearly six months, I have been unable to migrate 8 years of vital Outlook mail, contacts and calendars from my PC to my costly new MacBook, thereby rendering it functionally useless for corporate usage. Other famous utility failed repeatedly, but PST Converter Pro perfectly migrated more than 20,000 folder-specific emails, nearly 500 business contacts and my numerous calendars on the first try. With ease!!! Even thumbnail contact photographs migrated perfectly. I bow in awe and say, “Thank you!” for solving a seemingly insurmountable problem. Now, I can finally use and enjoy my Mac.You can really try the demo version once to try from http://www.pstconverterpro.com and they are really support much as compare to others.

  3. MoniT says:

    Actually, there is a much more convenient way: I tried the software at http://movemymailtomac.com and it worked perfectly. It’S even cheaper than the rest of the programs I found ($5 is okay I think) and it even transferred mails of my dusty old Outlook Express to my Mac which I had long forgotten about 🙂

  4. anthony says:

    you can try kDETools PST converter. This tool is easy to use everybody and provide 30 days money back guarantee also

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