Before replacing a computer running classic Outlook with Office Professional Plus 2021, decide which information is already held by your mail service and which information exists only locally. Those are different migration problems.
Identify what needs to move
List the accounts, local archives, contacts and calendars that matter. Confirm that your organisation permits the export, especially on a managed business device. Store the resulting file in a location appropriate for the information it contains.
Create a deliberate export
Microsoft’s classic Outlook instructions use File → Open & Export → Import/Export, followed by exporting to an Outlook Data File. Choose the account or folder you need and review whether subfolders are included. Each account should be considered separately.
- Give the export a name containing the account purpose and date.
- Check that the selected scope includes the folders you intend to preserve.
- Allow the export to finish before copying or disconnecting the destination drive.
- Keep a separate note of which account and date range the file covers.
Verify before retiring the old machine
A file existing on disk does not prove that the migration is complete. Inspect representative messages and folders using an appropriate Outlook import or open-data-file workflow. Check an old message, a recent message and an item in a nested folder.
Keep the original computer and source data available until the new setup has been checked. Do not assume a PST export recreates every account setting or that instructions for classic Outlook are identical to those for another Outlook application. Match the procedure to the application you are actually using.
Publisher reference: Microsoft: export Outlook data to a PST file.
Check the included applications on the Office Professional Plus 2021 product page when planning your replacement workstation.