Anyone who has ever moved an email environment knows the feeling: the fear that something will slip through the cracks. An old archive, a shared mailbox, that one alias where invoices still land. Migration is rarely a technical problem. It is a problem of trust. You are not just moving data, you are moving the daily work of your entire organisation.
That is why at Canvos we reverse the order. Not copy first and hope for the best, but first map out exactly what is there. Who has a forty-gigabyte mailbox? Who runs on three aliases? Which shared folders belong to no one? Only once that picture is clear does the migration begin, and then it runs predictably.
Step oneThe environment scan
Before a single message is moved, you connect your current environment to Canvos and run the environment analysis. In one pass it reads your entire tenant: every mailbox, every personal drive, every extra address. Not a sample, but everyone. The result is a list, sorted by size, that in seconds shows where the weight sits:
| User | Mailbox | Files | Alias |
|---|---|---|---|
| janjan@example.com | 41 GB | 96 GB | 3 |
| annaanna@example.com | 12 GB | 7 GB | 1 |
| accountingaccounting@example.com | 6 GB | – | 2 |
| teamteam@example.com shared | 3 GB | – | – |
| infoinfo@example.com | 1 GB | 0.4 GB | 4 |
In this example jan@example.com stands out immediately: 41 GB of mail and nearly 100 GB of files. That is not a problem, it is a decision. Does jan get a larger storage plan? Do we move the archive in one go or in phases? And those two unlicensed accounts are likely shared mailboxes such as team@example.com, which we will move as a mailbox later, not as a full user.
That is scoping: not guessing, but choosing based on numbers. And because the analysis also shows the aliases per person, you know in advance which addresses need to come along, including that one invoicing alias that would otherwise quietly disappear.
Step twoThe migration itself
With the scope clear, the rest is almost reassuringly boring, exactly as it should be. You tick what needs to come along, and Canvos moves it over: email with all folders, calendars, contacts and files. Every user lands in your organisation's own domain, so anna@example.com, not some foreign address.
Everything comes along, faithfully. The full folder structure, nested folders included. Aliases are recreated, shared mailboxes as mailboxes, and files keep their original modified date. Nothing quietly changes date or goes missing.
Everyone keeps working. The migration runs in the background and then keeps syncing continuously: new mail every fifteen minutes, files every hour. You do not have to lock anyone out on a Friday evening.
Welcome on the doormat. Every new user automatically receives a welcome email at their old address, with the details to log in right away. No separate rollout plan needed.
And because every step can run again without copying twice, there is no "big bang" moment where everything has to go right. Your old environment and Canvos exist side by side for a while; the sync keeps both level until you are ready to switch.
Step threeSwitching over, when you are ready
Once the backlog is zero, you point your domain's MX record to Canvos. New email arrives with us from that moment on; the last messages from your old platform are still picked up by the sync. One record, one moment you choose yourself, domain by domain if you like.
The safety netAnd if something goes wrong?
Then you simply keep working. If your old platform goes down temporarily during the transition, Canvos becomes your emergency location: your team carries on, and as soon as the other system is back, Canvos puts back everything that was created in the meantime. That return path only adds and never overwrites, so your original data stays untouched.
And storage? It can never derail the migration. If a mailbox or folder hits its limit, the migration stops cleanly with a clear message, instead of filling up your server. Safety is built in, not bolted on.
Moving is a choice, not a risk
Moving data is not hard. The confidence that everything comes along, that is the craft. By measuring first, then scoping, and only then moving with a sync that keeps running, migration becomes what it should be: a planned step, not a gamble. You see in advance what is there, you choose what comes along, and you switch over when you are ready. That is moving to a European, sovereign workplace without holding your breath.