Transfer Microsoft 365 Domain to Another Tenant without Data Loss

Microsoft does not allow the same domain to be used in multiple tenants. But if you want to migrate Office 365 domain to another tenant. This article will provide a step-by-step process. In addition, we will also explain how to secure your data during the procedure.

Office 365 or currently known as Microsoft 365 is a cloud based suite developed by Microsoft. It helps to improve businesses productivity, collaboration and communication. Here, you will get many Microsoft Office apps like Outlook, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint with the cloud services like Exchange Online, SharePoint, OneDrive, Microsoft Teams. According to your requirements, Office 365 comes with different plans with improved features and functions.

As the business grows over time, you face new challenges and want to increase your productivity. So to keep it in balance, you need to make changes in your Microsoft 365 environment. For this, moving your domain from your Office 365 tenant to another would be a great choice.

When Do You Need to Migrate Office 365 Domain to Another Tenant?

Transferring your entire domain from one Office 365 tenant to tenant is a huge decision. As it involves careful planning and executing the process to minimize data loss. So you should take this decision in the following scenarios.

• When two companies merge or one company acquires another, often domains and users combine in a single Microsoft 365 tenant.
• If one section of your business is being seperated. Then, the domain and the associated user account will need to move to a new tenant.
• When the company goes through rebranding, it is required to move its existing domain or data to a new tenant.
• It can also be used when the business is restructuring its Microsoft license or switching to different subscriptions.

There can be other instances to migrate your domain, but you understood the requirements of transferring your Office 365 domain. Before we go through the procedure, there are some points that you must prepare. We will first see those prerequisites, then go through the process.

Preparations Before Office 365 Domain Migration

• Prepare your Domain: When you are exporting your domain, it must be owned by you and you have the access to manage it in source as well as target tenants. Before adding to the target tenant. You have to first remove the domain from the source tenant and detach all users, groups, shared mailboxes and apps.
• Manage User Identity: Plan the user mapping between source and target tenants. If you are using Azure AD Connect and disable on the source tenant after the final sync and before domain removal.
• DNS Configuration: Keep your DNS TTL to 5 minutes to reduce the propagation delays. Also, verify your domain once you are added to the target tenant.
• Manage Email: To avoid mail flow interruption, plan the MX record cutover timing. If you use hybrid Exchange, update the configurations as well.
• Communication: Notify all your users in advance with detailed instructions. Before you migrate, Pilot test it with a few users.

Once you follow all these precautions, we are ready to move Office 365 domain between tenants. So, we are going to start the process with the first step and properly follow them.

Step-By-Step Process to Migrate Office 365 Domain to Another Tenant

Step 1: Prepare Target Tenant

The first step of the process is to prepare the target tenant. If you properly prepared your target tenant. Then, you can smoothly transfer your data with minimal downtime and disruptions. So, here you can do this.

1. First, we are going to set up a user account in the target tenant with the default Microsoft 365 domain. This is why, because temporary accounts allow you to configure and test your services before you migrate your actual domain.
2. In your target tenant, sign in with Global Administrator.
3. Click on Users and Active users button.
4. Select Add a user to create a new account.
5. Provide the first name, last name, and display your name.
6. Enter the username with temporary domain: ex [email protected].
7. Provide the password and select the location.
8. Choose the Microsoft 365 license and make sure that Exchange Online and other services are also included.
9. Lasty, click Next and Finish adding to complete the process.

You can also set up baseline policies and permissions to match your company’s requirements and make sure that your account is ready to receive the user and data.

Step 3: Prepare Users in Source Tenant

Before you remove the domain from the source tenant. You have to remove all the dependencies with the account first. Here, we update the user accounts and the services the domain uses.

1. In the source tenant, sign in using Global administrator.
2. Go to the Users and select the Active Users option.
3. Now, sort out your users or export the list of users with an email address. Alternatively you can use PowerShell by giving this command:
   Get-MsolUser | Where-Object {$_.UserPrincipalName -like "*@company.com"}.
4. By using the PowerShell we change the user principal names:
   Set-MsolUserPrincipalName -UserPrincipalName [email protected] -NewUserPrincipalName [email protected]. use this same to all the users.
5. We are going to remove the custom domain from users’ primary email addresses:
   Set-Mailbox [email protected] -PrimarySmtpAddress [email protected].
   Also, remove secondary aliases from the domain: Set-Mailbox [email protected] -EmailAddresses @{remove="[email protected]"}
6. Run this command to check any shared mailboxes, Groups, and DLs:
   Get-Mailbox -RecipientTypeDetails SharedMailbox | Where-Object {$_.PrimarySmtpAddress -like "*@company.com"}
Get-DistributionGroup | Where-Object {$_.PrimarySmtpAddress -like "*@company.com"}
7. Remove any proxy addresses with your domain:
   Get-Mailbox | Where {$_.EmailAddresses -like "*@company.com"} | Set-Mailbox -EmailAddresses @{remove="[email protected]"}
8. Lastly, follow this command to make sure there is no users, groups, mailboxes, or services are using in this domain:
   Get-MsolUser | Where-Object {$_.UserPrincipalName -like "*@company.com"}
Get-Mailbox | Where-Object {$_.EmailAddresses -like "*@company.com"}
Get-DistributionGroup | Where-Object {$_.EmailAddresses -like "*@company.com"}

Now, we are ready to remove the domain to migrate Office 365 domain to another tenant.

Step 4: Remove Domain from Source Tenant

For the transition of your domain to the new Microsoft 365 domain. You need to first detach or remove the domain from the source tenant. This is because Microsoft does not allow users to have the same domain in two tenants at the same time. Therefore, it is necessary to remove it, below are the steps on how you can do this.

1. First, log in to your Office 365 and go to the Users and Active Users option.
2. Click on the check box next to the username you want to move.
3. Select the Edit Domains from the bulk actions panel.
4. Choose a different domain and select set as a primary option. Save the changes.
5. After that, Click on Groups then Group Name. Choose the Group that is associated with the domain.
6. Select the Edit option and choose another group from the Group ID. Save this and close it.
7. Lastly, click on the Setup option and Domains.
8. Choose the domain you want to remove.
9. From the right pane, click on Remove. Now, close this panel.

Step 5: Add Domain to New Tenant & Update DNS

After removing the domain from the destination tenant. We are now creating a new domain. But, for this, you have to first update your DNS records. Here’s how you can do it.

1. Sign in to the Admin center, then click on Setup and Domains.
2. Select the Add Domain option and enter the name of the domain you want to add. Press the Next button.
3. Now, Microsoft displays a TXT record which you need to add in your domain registrar.
4. In the new browser, log in to your domain registrar. Then, go to the managed DNS records or DNS settings.
5. Select Add Record and TXT file. Paste details that Microsoft provided in Step 3.
6. Set your TTL to 1 hour or the lowest.
7. Once it is done, Save or apply changes to your DNS records.
8. Again, go to Microsoft 365 Admin Center and click on the Verify button.
9. When it is verified, choose to add the records myself to manually update your additional DNS records.

Step 6: Migrate Your Mailboxes and Data

Now that you have added your domain, it is time to migrate your data to the new tenant. To do this, IMAP migration will be very helpful. With this you can easily migrate Office 365 tenant to tenant. Alternatively you can move your backup copy of the data in this new tenant as well.

Once you move the data, now test run if the domain is properly connected to the account or all the data is in your tenant or not.

Post-Migration Checklist

After you have completed the process of migrating the Office 365 domain to another tenant. Now, you need to configure your account to the new tenant environment.

• Reassign the admin roles, shared mailbox access, mailbox permissions and configure the user roles.
• Re-add your account to Outlook, reconfigure your mobile devices and monitor your email flow.

Concluding Words

Whenever you want to migrate Office 365 domains to another tenant, follow the above steps. Here, we explained each step in detail. So, you can easily transfer your domain. Apart from this, we also discuss the scenarios where you need to move a domain from one Microsoft 365 tenant to another. If you have any queries related to domain migration, you can contact our support team.