An Ultimate Guide for Exchange Mailbox Backup and Restore Process
Most Microsoft Exchange Server administrators are careful about the data items stored on servers to the point of backing them up regularly. This process ensures that if the Exchange database fails due to any reason, then data can be easily restored from the backup file. In today’s arena where emails have been used at a large scale, people cannot afford to lose any single email. So, it is essential to perform an Exchange mailbox backup and restore process. However, this guide is all about backing up and restoring the Exchange data items.
Table of Content
How to Backup and Restore Exchange Mailbox?
If you want to perform backup and restore Exchange mailboxes, then first you need to create a backup of Exchange mailboxes in PST format. After that, you can restore the Exchange data from the mailboxes via the resultant PST file. We will discuss both steps in the next section.
Two Steps of Exchange Mailbox Backup and Restore Process
Step 1 – Backup Exchange Mailbox
To create a backup of Exchange Server mailboxes, people use the Windows server backup process. You can also use the export Exchange Mailbox to PST utility to take a backup of Exchange mailboxes in PST format. This tool provides an option to save entire Exchange data items like emails, contacts, calendars, and tasks to PST format with the help of an admin account.
This tool is designed with such an algorithm that it can easily perform safe and secure migration. It is accessible in all versions of Outlook and supports Exchange 2016, 13, and below versions. To create a backup of Microsoft Exchange, perform the following steps given below:
Step 1. Download and Run the tool on the systems. Select Source and Destination platforms such as Exchange and Outlook.
Step 2. Tick the checkboxes that you want to backup and apply the Date filter to filter out the required data only.
Step 3. Enter the Source Exchange server credentials such as Exchange server version, Admin Email, Password, AD IP, Exchange server IP, and Include Sub Domain. Validate all the entered credentials and then Next.
Step 4. In the Destination window, provide the path to save the resulting PST file and file size. After validating the location, hit on the Next.
Step 5. Fetch all the users into the tool using several options such as Fetch Users, Import Users, and Download template. Finally, click on the Start Export button to start the process.
This is all about the first step to perform the Exchange mailbox backup and restore process. Now check out the restore process in the following segment.
Step 2 – Restore Backup File
If you have created a backup of Exchange mailboxes in PST file and now you need to restore the data on the Exchange Server. Then, you can use the Exchange Import program for this purpose. This application helps users to import PST files to Microsoft Exchange Server without facing any issues. It maintains the complete folder hierarchy during the restoring process. You can also restore Exchange database to different server if required.
Let’s look at the working of the Exchange Import tool to perform the Exchange mailbox backup and restore process.
Step 1. Download, Install, and Run the tool. Choose Outlook as the Source and Exchange as the Destination.
Step 2. Select the workload item and apply the Date filter as per requirement.
Step 3. In the Source window, enter the path of the backup file. Validate it and then move to Next.
Step 4. Now, complete the required credentials for the destination account such as Exchange server IP, version, and Admin details. Validate them and then Next.
Step 5. Fetch the users into the tool. Validate all the users and map them to destination users. Lastly, click on the Start Import button to restore the Exchange mailbox.
Conclusion
An Exchange mailbox can contain lots of crucial information. So, it is required to have a backup of Exchange mailboxes for recovery of data in the case of any disaster. Hence, in this post, we have talked about the Exchange mailbox backup and restore process. You can use Exchange Export software to backup Exchange mailboxes in PST and Exchange Import application to restore the information from a backup.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1. How do I create a backup file of the Exchange mailbox?
Ans – You just need to use the above-mentioned export tool with the below steps:-
- Step 1. Download and choose Source & Destination.
- Step 2. Select workload items.
- Step 3. Provide source and destination details.
- Step 4. Fetch users and start the backup process.
Q2. How to restore Exchange mailbox from the backup file?
Ans – Just use the Exchange import tool and apply the below steps:-
- Step 1. Download, set up, and select both platforms.
- Step 2. Choose items under the workload section.
- Step 3. Enter the source and destination credentials.
- Step 4. Load the users and start the restore process.
Q3. How much time is required to perform the Exchange mailbox backup and restore process?
Ans – It depends upon the data that you have in the Exchange mailboxes. If you are using the above-mentioned automated tools then the process takes less time as compared to the manual solutions.