Moving email between platforms can become surprisingly technical once PST, OST, OLM, EML, MBOX, NSF, and Outlook compatibility enter the picture. This tag groups practical guides on email migration, conversion, importing, exporting, recovery, and mailbox-file management across Windows and Mac environments.
Saving Outlook for Mac emails as PDF files is useful when you need a portable record that can be opened outside Outlook, shared with someone who does not use Microsoft 365, attached to a case file, or archived as a human-readable document. On a Mac, the most reliable built-in method is to print the message […]
Did you know that PST files let users save their emails in a specific file on their devices locally? Users who want quick access to their emails without depending on an internet connection can find this helpful. PST files can also be used to back up your email correspondence. However, you could have problems locating […]
An import OLM workflow is often required when moving legacy Outlook for Mac data into another mail environment. OLM is the archive format used by Outlook for Mac, while PST is the Outlook data-file format commonly used by Outlook for Windows and some Microsoft 365 workflows. Converting OLM to PST can be useful when moving […]
MBOX and PST are different mailbox formats, so an MBOX archive cannot normally be treated as an Outlook PST file simply by changing its extension. MBOX stores messages in a mailbox-style structure used by applications such as Thunderbird and by exports from some other mail clients, while PST is an Outlook data-file format. The correct […]
An OLM file is an Outlook for Mac archive. Thunderbird does not natively treat OLM as one of its normal mailbox formats, so an OLM archive generally cannot simply be dragged into Thunderbird and opened. The practical migration path is to convert or export the Outlook data into a format Thunderbird understands—most commonly MBOX—and then […]
OST (Offline Storage Table) files are used by Microsoft Outlook to create a local copy of mailbox data from an Exchange server. They enable users to access their emails, contacts, and other items offline, syncing changes with the server when connected. PST (Personal Storage Table) files are a type of data file in Outlook that […]
Outlook OST files are not normal archive files. An OST—Offline Outlook Data File—is primarily a synchronized local cache used by Outlook for Windows with Exchange, Microsoft 365, Outlook.com, and some other account types. Its purpose is to let Outlook continue working when the computer is temporarily offline and then synchronize changes with the mail server […]
MBOX is one of the oldest and most widely recognized mailbox-storage formats. Instead of storing every email as a separate file, an MBOX mailbox typically stores many messages sequentially inside one plain-text file. The format has been used by Thunderbird, Apple Mail exports, Unix mail systems, and many other applications. Finding an MBOX file can […]
A PST file is an Outlook data file that can contain email, contacts, calendars, and other Outlook items. CSV is a plain-text table format designed for structured rows and columns. Converting PST to CSV therefore requires deciding which type of PST data you actually need. Contacts fit naturally into CSV, while entire email messages do […]
MBOX and MSG are two very different ways of storing email. An MBOX file usually contains many email messages concatenated into one mailbox file or mailbox package, while an MSG file normally represents one individual Microsoft Outlook item with its message properties, attachments, recipients, timestamps, and other metadata. On a Mac, converting MBOX to MSG […]
