How to transfer your emails and contacts from Outlook to Proton Mail

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Category: Migration guides

Congratulations on joining the Proton community! Proton Mail offers you an ad-free email service that safeguards your personal conversations with strong encryption. Learn more about what makes Proton Mail different(new window).

This short guide gets you up and running with Proton Mail if you are transferring from Outlook. No matter how many emails, attachments, and contacts you have stored in your Outlook account, you can seamlessly move them to Proton Mail by following the steps below.

If you would like to know more about a particular topic, skip to:

Transfer existing emails
Set up email forwarding
Transfer contacts
Inform your contacts
Update online accounts
Get the most out of Proton Mail

If you need help transitioning from other email providers, check out our migration guides for Gmail(new window) and Yahoo(new window).

Transfer existing emails

Moving your mailbox to Proton Mail is quick and simple with the Easy Switch(new window) app.

To launch Easy Switch, sign in to your Proton Account at account.proton .me and go to Settings → All settings → Import via Easy Switch and select Outlook.

Set up email forwarding

Once you’ve imported existing messages, continue with the setup of automatic forwarding. This ensures that all the new messages sent to your old Outlook account also arrive in your Proton Mail inbox. Once senders learn your new Proton address, they can reach you directly at your Proton Mail address.

Keep in mind that messages forwarded from Outlook first go through Outlook’s servers. This means they will only be TLS encrypted, and not end-to-end encrypted(new window), and Outlook can access them.

Here are 4 quick steps to forward your Outlook messages to Proton Mail:

At the top of the page, select Settings → View all Outlook settings.
Select Mail and then Forwarding.
Select Start forwarding.
Enter your Proton Mail address and select Save.

Transfer contacts

Proton Mail offers a private, secure space for all your contacts. You can create an encrypted contact list(new window) in just two steps: export to a CSV file and import it to Proton Mail.

To export your Outlook contacts to a CSV:

Go to People at the bottom of the page on the web Outlook version.
Select Manage → Export contacts in the toolbar.
Choose to export all contacts or only contacts from a specific folder and select Export.
At the bottom of the page, select Save to save the CSV in your default Downloads folder.

To import the CSV to Proton Mail:

Open your Proton Mail account in a browser on your desktop.
Select Import in the left menu on the Contacts page.
Drop your CSV file in the box or click on the box to select the CSV.
Select Import.

Inform your contacts

Tell your contacts you are using a new email address. You could send out a short Proton Mail email to say hi and order a new set of business cards.

Please keep in mind that Proton Mail imposes limits on the number of emails you can send at once to avoid spam and phishing attempts. The limits depend on many criteria, including the behavior of the sender.

Learn more about sending limits(new window)

To make this transition easier, you can share your short domain email address @pm.me with your contacts. Emails received via @pm.me appear in the same inbox as those using your @proton.me address. All Proton Mail accounts, free and paid, can receive emails at this address, and paid accounts can use it to send emails too.

For example, if your email address is [email protected], the associated @pm.me email address is [email protected].

Learn more about Proton Mail’s @pm.me address(new window)

Update online accounts

Connect your online accounts to Proton Mail to protect your sensitive communications, instead of using your Outlook address as a point of contact. By migrating messages related to finance, health, and shopping to Proton Mail, you will avoid having this personal information used to profile you and potentially exposed or sold to third parties.

This has to be done on an individual account basis, so you can also use this opportunity to review your accounts’ security settings and delete accounts you no longer use.

Start with accounts holding sensitive information: banks, tax services, or file storage.

Continue with accounts you use daily: social media, online shopping, or entertainment.

Update the rest of your accounts over time. Create a separate folder(new window) in your Proton Mail account where you automatically forward(new window) emails from your Outlook account. This will help you quickly spot which contacts are still using your old email address. To remind your contacts about your new email address, set up an auto-reply on Outlook (new window)each time your contacts email you at your old address.

Once you have updated the accounts you want to continue receiving emails from, you can delete your Outlook account(new window). This brings you back in control over which websites or organizations have your contact details.

If later you decide to regain access to any account still associated with your Outlook address, you can use the recovery email address or the phone number you provided at signup. Alternatively, you can contact the support team of the service you’re trying to gain access to.

Sign up with your Proton Mail address from now on. All of your information and account updates will be securely encrypted.

Get the most out of Proton Mail

Proton Mail supports a set of features and apps for quick access on different devices, strong privacy protection, an organized inbox, and efficient communication.

Download Proton Mail apps

Download Proton Mail apps for all your devices. This will give you quick access to an interface optimized for your device and allow you to use Proton Mail features, including encrypted emailing, wherever you are.

Get Proton Mail for iOS(new window) or Android(new window)

Get Proton Mail Bridge

If you use an email desktop app such as Outlook, Thunderbird, or Apple Mail, install Proton Mail Bridge to safely read and write encrypted messages in your email desktop app. Our guides(new window) help you configure it correctly.

Download Proton Mail Bridge(new window)

Use a custom domain

Proton Mail allows you to set up your custom email address for domains you own in a few easy steps.

Access your hosting service or domain name provider (e.g. Google Domains, Cloudflare, etc.). Log in to your account and update the domain’s DNS records to point to Proton Mail.

Learn how to use custom domains with Proton Mail(new window)

After updating the DNS records, wait 24 hours for the records to propagate and test it by sending an email to your custom domain’s email address — it should go right to your Proton Mail inbox.

Use multiple email aliases

Proton Mail also allows you to receive emails to an unlimited number of aliases(new window). If you don’t want to enter your actual email address, build an alias by adding a + to your username. This feature is available to all users. For example, if your email is [email protected], you will also receive the emails sent to [email protected] in your inbox.

Aliases together with filters help you manage your inbox. You can also use them to protect against phishing attempts or spam by assigning an alias to each account you register with. This helps you quickly identify the source of spam.

Organize your new inbox

Use folders and labels(new window) to quickly locate emails on certain topics or from particular senders. Create filters(new window) to automatically sort email into custom folders and labels and to clear your inbox of spam.

Import your calendar

Proton Calendar(new window) brings you one step closer to complete freedom from tech giants such as Gmail, Yahoo, or Microsoft. Available now in beta, Proton Calendar uses end-to-end encryption on your events’ details, making your plans and appointments available only to you.

To import your existing calendar(new window) to Proton Calendar, you first have to export it from Outlook(new window).