Microsoft Debuts Exchange Admin Center Migrations for G Suite Content

Microsoft plans on expanding third-party support for its Exchange Admin Center. The company says users will soon be able to integrate more deeply with Google G Suite. Specifically, G Suite contacts, Gmail data, and calendar information will be able to be exported to the Office 365 tool. In an announcement this week, Microsoft says the support will come to Exchange Admin Center “in the coming weeks”. While the integration is nice, it is worth noting moving G Suite content will be a 10-step process, alongside any checks IT admins have to perform before using Google tools in an organization. However, one those steps are complete, migrations from Google's productivity platform to Exchange can happen. Microsoft says G Suite to Office 365 migration can happen through Exchange Admin Center or Exchange Online PowerShell. The company says interested organizations should answer the following questions to better understand the size of the migration task:

1. “What is the size of the organization you are trying to migrate?
2. Based on your business requirements, would you like to migrate using a “cutover” (everyone at once) or “staged” (longer-term coexistence) approach?
3. What is the (approximate) average mailbox size that you'd be migrating?
4. What kind of data do you need to migrate – like mail, calendar and contacts?
5. Given the answers to the above questions, does this migration tool fit my needs?”

Migrations

Migrations are customizable. Customers can conduct a “cutover migration” where all G Suite content gets sent at once. Alternatively, there is a “staged migration” which splits up movements over a longer timeframe. Organizations with vast datasets in G Suite shouldn't hold out for swift processing. Indeed, migration is capped to 2GB of data per mailbox each day. Microsoft says migrations are automatic once sent, so will resume the next day without user interaction. Yep, that's slow progress indeed, although Microsoft is quick to point out “this limit is enforced by Google”.