How to Upgrade Office 2019 to Office 365?

Summary: This article is an informative guide for all readers who are facing issues while upgrading Office 2019 to Office 365. This article includes the system requirements and pre-planning before upgrading the license. Lastly, we introduce a walkaround section where user understand the cases required for migrating data from Office 2019 to O365.

As Microsoft 365 gained popularity, old versions of Microsft users became curious about the features provided in M365. Those who know the Microsoft 365 suite feature are astonished but don’t know how to upgrade. Some previous version users know the steps to upgrading to M365 but they are concerned about data loss. I’ll try to provide answers to all the queries mentioned above in this article.

Microsoft is offering a subscription-based plan for all Office applications under the Microsoft 365 suite. The idea is to bring all the Office apps, like OneDrive, Outlook, Teams, and many more, into one place instead of purchasing them independently.

Features of Office 365

• Microsoft 365 enhances collaboration and robust productivity. 
• M365 provides different plans from basic to enterprise level so that users don’t need to pay extra money for unnecessary apps. 
• Users get more mailbox storage space in Microsoft 365 as compared to previous versions.
• Microsoft 365 allows small-scale to large-scale businesses to foster teamwork through Teams and the Outlook app.
• Users also get more security features to protect data from cyberattacks, such as Microsoft Defender and Microsoft Purview.
• M365 users also get automatic upgrades, while in the 2019 version, users have to upgrade manually. 
• Microsoft also provides a Copilot tool for AI-generative M365 plans.

Upgrading Office 2019 to Office 365

Upgrading from the previous version to Office 365 has two different ways, but before that, we must check the pre-planning or system requirements for a safe upgrade.

#1 Pre-Planning before Upgrading 2019 to O365

• First, take a backup of all your Office 2019 data manually or use an automated backup tool. 
• Make sure your system supports Office 365 applications. 
• Do a compatibility check by ensuring the operating system supports the Microsft 365 suite.
• Browse the O365 plans to which you want to upgrade from Office 2019.

#2 System Requirement

• Processor: 1.6 GHz processor.
• RAM: 4 GB.
• Operating system: 64-bit Windows 8.1/10/111.
• Office 365 version: 32-bit or 64-bit version of Microsoft 365.

#3 Purchasing an Office 365 License

Users can purchase an Office 365 license from the official Microsoft website by logging in with their account. After that, users can simply install the apps on their local system by logging into a Microsoft account. However, a Mac user can purchase the subscription from the App Store and then link an Office account. This will help users easily upgrade Office applications on the local system.

Also read: Compare Office 365 Plans

#4 Changing the License Key of Office 2019 to Office 365

If you already own a one-time purchased license of Microsoft Office 2019 versions, here is how you can upgrade to the latest Microsoft 365 version.

• Step 1: Log in to Microsoft with valid credentials.
• Step 2: Go to the file tab and click the Account option.
• Step 3: Under the Account tab, click the Change License option.
• Step 4: A pane opens, showing all the Office licenses you purchased. Select the Office 365 license. 
• Step 5: Restart the system and again log in to Microsoft with the same account.

Note: Microsoft will automatically validate and show you a “Product Activated” message, but it takes some time. If you want to update Office 365 immediately, then click the “Update Now” button. Your old version will be automatically replaced with the latest version. 

Upgrade from Office 2019 to Office 365: Alternative Method

• Step 1: Open any Office app and sign out of your account.
• Step 2: Go to System Settings, then select the Apps option, and click on the Apps & Features option. Browse to the Office app, right-click on it, and click the uninstall option.
• Step 3: Download and buy a subscription to Microsoft 365.
• Step 4: Open the downloaded file and launch it on your system. (Office 365 is installed.)
• Step 5: Recheck your Office version.

WalkArounds

Suppose an admin wants to upgrade immediately from Office 2019 to Office 365 by changing the license key. This means users want to migrate Outlook, Word, and Excel data immediately from On-premise to cloud applications. Office 2019 does not provide a cloud-based OneDrive storage space. To migrate mailbox data, users go for cutover migration, which takes a few days and allows migrating up to 2000 mailboxes. This functionality restricts users to the immediate use of previous version emails in Office 365. Cutover does not allow to migration of other application data, such as Word and Excel.

To immediately migrate Outlook and other application data from Office 2019 to Office 365. Users can opt for Office 365 Import Software as an automated tool to easily migrate Office 2019 data to Office 365. This tool allows users to Migrate Outlook 2019 data to Office 365 Outlook. This tool also migrates Office 2019 Word and Excel data to Office 365 OneDrive storage.

Steps to Migrate Outlook 2019 to Office 365

To migrate the data, the user has to first download the Outlook 2019 data in (.pst) file format. 

• Step 1: Download and Launch the automated tool. Use this link to download (URL) 
• Step 2: Select source as Outlook and Destination as Office 365. 

Note: For Word and Excel data, users can select File System as a source.

• Step 3: Under the Workload Section, select the Categories to import. Use the Date-range filter for importing specific date data.  
• Step 4: Browse the folder where Outlook PST files are stored. Click the Next button.
• Step 5: Click the Validate button, then click the Next button. Then enter Admin email and Application ID in the destination tab.
• Step 6: Click on Validate, then specify users from any one option (Import User, Fetch User, Download Template).
• Step 7: Click the Start Import button.

Note: The user has to create a console project in Office 365. To learn more, use this link. Users also require Microsoft .NET Framework 4.8.0 or above.

Final Words

Office 2019 is an outdated version; if you want to switch to Office 365, then uninstall the 2019 version and install Office 365. After upgrading to O365, users can use an automated tool to migrate 2019 Office data to the newly installed version.