Export Office 365 Mail Accounts to PST

Using the eDiscovery Content Search tool, administrators can download a copy of a users Office 365 Mail data in a PST format. This PST can be used for legal requests, archiving, importing into another service and more. Follow the guide below to creating and downloading an Export Request.

Before you Start

It's important that the user account being used to export data has the appropriate permissions. If you need to assign or verify that the permissions are set, please follow this guide.

Creating a eDiscovery Content Search

1. Open the Microsoft Compliance Center in Microsoft Edge.
2. On the right-hand navigation panel, click Content Search.
3. On the Search toolbar, click New Search button (plus icon).
4. Enter a Name (required) and a description (optional) then click Next.
5. Under Specific Locations, enable the Exchange mailboxes option.
6. Click the Choose users, groups or teams link.
7. Find and click the user you would like to export.
8. Click Done then click Next.
9. To pull the entire mailbox, leave the conditions at default.
10. Click Next, then click Submit.
11. Wait until the export, on the Content Search page, has a completed status.

Exporting the Results

1. With the Compliance Center open in Microsoft Edge, verify that the Content Search has been completed.
2. Click the Content Search you wish to download.
3. Click the Actions button in the lower left-hand corner, then click Export Results.
4. On the Export Results pane, select All items, including one that have unrecognized format, are encrypted or weren't indexed for other reasons.
5. Leave One PST file for each mailbox selected.
6. Click Export.
7. When the job has been created, click Ok. If you receive an error, follow the Server Error 500 When Exporting Results guide.

Downloading the PST file

1. Open the Compliance Center Content Search page in Microsoft Edge.
2. Click the Export tab.
3. Click the export to be downloaded.
4. Under the Export Key group, click Copy to clipboard.
   1. Keep this key secure! This key can be used by anyone to download the information.
5. Click the Download Results button at the top of the Export pane. If the button is grayed out, the export isn't finished. Scroll down to the Status group to view the status of the export.
6. When prompted, click Open, if prompted click Install.
7. In the eDiscovery Export Tool, paste in the export key.
8. Click the Browse button to select a location to download the file to.
9. Click Start.
10. Close the Tool when the processing has completed.

More Information

Feature reference for Content search - Microsoft 365 Compliance | Microsoft Docs