We all use an email service, a webmail, to get an email address and send or receive messages, such as Outlook.com, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Libero Mail etc.
When you use an online service to receive emails, you can download messages to your PC using an email program such as Microsoft Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Apple Mail or other clients to read mail from your PC, notebook or smartphone.
Emails often contain very important information and attachments. Although checking them is very easy - you just need to use search to find the message you need - we must not forget that you can lose them due to a domain transfer.
If you use email for work, you know well how important it is because it is the daily correspondence with customers and suppliers. If you lost your emails after a domain migration, it would mean a big loss of money.
Business mailboxes are often tied to the domain and hosted at the provider.
In situations like these, a change in commercial agreements, a change to the domain name or a host change is enough to lose access to your emails.
It is therefore best to set up periodic backups of your mailboxes right away.
Creating a backup file to save directly on your PC also has a double advantage.
First, it lets us create local copies of our mail archives, so we can keep and consult them without the risk that they are deleted or removed from the server.
The second advantage is being able to clean up the inbox and delete all older messages, to free up space in the webmail if it is almost full.
The easiest way to make a local backup is to rely on the specific functions available in mail clients.
Below are the guides for creating backups in the main mail clients:
Microsoft Outlook
To export a backup:
1. At the top, go to File, select Open and Export and then Import/Export;
2. Select Export to a file and click Next;
3. Choose Outlook Data File (pst);
4. Choose the folder of your email account you want to back up;
5. Enter or confirm the save path and click Finish.
To import a backup:
1. At the top, go to File, select Open and Export and then Import/Export;
2. Select Import data from other programs or files and click Next;
3. Choose Outlook Data File (pst) and click Next;
4. Choose the Outlook Data File (pst) you want to import by going to Browse;
5. Under Options, choose how to import email messages or contacts;
6. Click Finish and wait for the operation to complete.
Apple Mail
To export a backup:
1. From the Mail app, right-click the mail folder you want to export;
2. Select Export Mailbox;
3. Choose the path where to save the exported mailbox and click Choose;
4. Repeat the procedure for each folder.
To import a backup:
1. From the Mail app, click at the top on File;
2. Select Import Mailboxes;
3. Choose the option Files in mbox format and click Continue;
4. Go to the folder where you saved the previously exported file, select the file and click Choose.
Thunderbird
If you have a Windows PC
To export a backup:
1. Go to the Users folder and click your personal folder;
2. Select the hidden AppData folder. If you can’t find this folder, enable the display of hidden files in your system;
3. Look for the Roaming folder and double-click;
4. Go to the Thunderbird folder and right-click and select Copy;
5. You can save this folder to any storage space, such as a USB stick, an SD card or an external hard drive by selecting Paste with the right mouse button.
To import a backup:
1. From your storage device, right-click and select Copy:
2. Go to the Users folder and click your personal folder;
3. Select the hidden AppData folder. If you can’t find this folder, enable the display of hidden files in your system;
4. Look for the Roaming folder and double-click;
5. In a free spot in the folder, right-click and select Paste;
6. Confirm that you want to overwrite the current folder.
If you have a Mac
To export a backup:
1. Click the menu button, then click Help and from the submenu select Troubleshooting Information;
2. Click Show in Finder. The Thunderbird profile folder will open;
3. Close Thunderbird;
4. From the profile folder, open the Go menu and select Enclosing Folder twice;
5. Hold down the Control key while clicking the Thunderbird folder and select Copy "Thunderbird";
6. You can save this folder to any storage space, such as a USB stick, an SD card or an external hard drive; hold down the ctrl key while clicking inside the drive and select Paste Item.
To import a backup:
1. Hold down the ctrl key while clicking the Thunderbird backup folder, saved in your storage space, and select Copy "Thunderbird";
2. Start Thunderbird and close the account setup window, if shown;
3. Click the menu button, then click Help and from the submenu select Troubleshooting Information;
4. Click Show in Finder. The Thunderbird profile folder will open;.
5. Close Thunderbird.
6. From the profile folder, open the Go menu and select Enclosing Folder twice;
7. Hold down the Control key while clicking inside the folder and select Paste item.
8. When prompted, confirm replacing the current data.
