Hybrid migration Exch 2010 to Exch Online still possible ?

Copper Contributor

Hello all,

Exchange 2010 being out of support is it still possible to migrate to Exchange Onine through the hybrid method ? Do the Hybrid configuration Wizard still work ? We have customers that are still with Exchange 2010 and intend to migrate to Exchange Online.

 

Thanks

2 Replies

Hey @Lohenthal 

 

Being out of support usually means that you will no longer receive updates on your legacy software. You will not be able to call MS for help and MS would no longer release Security fixes for vulnerabilities for your software. While it is still possible to setup hybrid from an updated exchange 2010 box :

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/enterprise/exchange-2010-end-of-support?view=o365-wor....

If you read between the lines Microsoft carefully emphasizes on the state your servers were in as of October 13, 2020 before deciding to continue with hybrid. On some outdated boxes setting up hybrid might not be a good idea; third party tools like migrationwiz etc may be a better choice for those servers.

 

Thanks

Your best move is likely to install a minimal Exchange 2016 footprint and use that for the migration. This is a loaded topic so I won't elaborate much, other than to say that you can do this (introduce 2016) in a way that users will be impacted by the change, or in a way that users won't be impacted. The latter is pretty commonly done, the former (the official/proper way) is also done, just less often.

In either case, knowing Exchange client access (URLs, FQDNs, Autodiscover, etc.) is key to controlling what impact is had by introducing Exchange 2016 into the organization.