When you are setting up your new reseller account with us, you will most likely want to bring over your existing email accounts and any emails that exist on your old hosting server. This article will provide you instructions on how to move your emails from a non-cPanel host to InMotion Hosting.
Moving your emails from your old host
The steps involved will differ depending on whether you were using the IMAP or POP3 protocols to check your emails prior to the move. If you are unsure which protocol you were using, be sure to check the settings in the email client program you use.
You will also need to create the email accounts on your new InMotion Hosting server. If you need assistance with that, check out our article on how to create an email account in cPanel.
POP3 Accounts
If you use the POP3 protocol to check your emails, all the emails received are downloaded to the checking device, most commonly a computer. As the emails are already downloaded to your local machine, you will not have to take any further steps to transfer them to the new hosting server.
IMAP Accounts
For those using IMAP, you will need to take steps necessary to move the emails from your old hosting server to your new reseller server. The instructions provided use the Thunderbird email client, but can be followed using other clients, such as Outlook or MacMail.
Transferring the emails
- Create the destination email account on your InMotion server cPanel.
- Set up a new email account in your mail client to point to the new InMotion email account. You will need to use the server name instead of your domain name if your domain is still pointed to your old host.
- Ensure both email accounts are connected via your email client.
- Highlight all emails on the account you are moving from.
- Right click on the messages and select ‘Copy To’ and then select the Inbox you want to copy the emails over to (the new account.)
- The transfer will begin. You may see a progress message at the bottom of the email client.
- Once completed, click on the new Inbox so you can see the transferred emails.
- As a precaution, you can log directly into your webmail to verify that the emails were transferred to the server. This should match what you see in your email client.
How to ensure you do not lose any new emails after a name server change
Once you have completed migrating your website to the new server, you will need to finalize it by updating your name servers to point to your InMotion Hosting server. The propagation time after pointing your domain to its new name servers can take up to 24 hours. During this time, you will want to make sure you do not lose any emails that may come your way. Below we outline two different ways to ensure you do not miss any important emails during this time.
- Create an email forwarder at your old host that forwards to a third party email account (one that does not have your domain name, such as gmail, hotmail, etc.)
- Check your email at your old host with a webmail interface. This will not require your domain name. You may need to contact the old host for the proper URL using the server name.
Change your MX records
If you happen to use third party companies for your email and do not need to use our servers for your email services, you will need to modify your MX records on our servers so that the third party email remains unaffected. It is best if you perform this within the cPanel before you point the domain to us, however be sure to do it as soon as possible afterwards if you did not do so.
Summary
Using the instructions above that are relevant to your situation will allow you to transfer your emails over from your old host to your new InMotion Reseller Hosting account without any headaches!
