This tutorial will instruct you how to do one of the following (depending on which e-mail you like best):

• POP to Hotmail (including Sent Mail and folders)
• POP to Gmail (including Sent Mail and folders)

It’s easy enough to move everything in the inbox to a Hotmail or Gmail account. But what’s more important is your sent mail and mail you have stored in separate folders. There are many instances where you will need to get access to this, and without the ability to move everything, the move simply isn’t worth it.

The instructions here will give you everything you need to know to move all the mail to a new Hotmail or Gmail account.

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The easiest way to move mail to Gmail or Hotmail is by using the Windows Live Mail e-mail client. Even if you decide afterwards that you want to use the web-based interface or another client, WLmail is the fastest way to initially move your POP mail.

For those that have use Outlook Express, WLmail is very similar in the way it works. In fact it is essentially a newer better version of OE.

The steps involved in moving POP mail to Gmail or Hotmail is to do the following:

1. Set up your existing POP mail account in WLmail.
2. Set up your new Gmail or Hotmail account in WLmail.
3. Import all mail from your old e-mail program into WLmail.
4. Move the POP mail to your Gmail or Hotmail account from within the WLmail client.

Adding your old POP e-mail account in WLmail

1. Click Add an e-mail account from the left sidebar.
2. Enter the e-mail accounts e-mail address and password.
3. Set your display name as your name (or whatever name you wish).
4. Check the box to Manually configure server settings for e-mail account.
5. On the next screen, select the incoming mail server as POP3.
6. Enter in the incoming server’s server address (this is provided by your ISP or whatever POP service you use).
7. Your Login ID is usually your e-mail address itself.
8. The outgoing server address is provided by your ISP or whatever POP e-mail service you use.

Adding a Gmail e-mail account in WLmail

1. In your Gmail account on the internet, enable IMAP.
2. In WLmail, click Add an e-mail account from the left sidebar.
3. Enter your Gmail e-mail address and password.
4. Set your display name as your name (or whatever name you wish).
5. Check the box to Manually configure server settings for e-mail account.
6. On the next screen, select incoming mail server as IMAP.
7. Set the incoming server port to 993.
8. Check the box for This server requires a secure connection (SSL).
9. Type in your Login ID as your full Gmail e-mail address.
10. Type in the outgoing server as smtp.gmail.com
11. Set the outgoing server port to 465.
12. Check the box for This server requires a secure connection (SSL). (NOTE: If your outgoing server port reverts back to 25 when you check this box, change it back to 465.)
13. Check the box for My outgoing server requires authentication.

Adding a Hotmail account in WLmail

1. Click Add an e-mail account from the left sidebar.
2. Type in your full Hotmail e-mail address and password.
3. Set your display name as your name (or whatever name you wish).
4. Next/Finish – you’re done.

Importing mail into WLmail

Click File/Import/Messages. See figure below.

Select the old e-mail client you’re using (if using Thunderbird it should be in the list). See figure below.

WLmail will confirm the location of your old mail. See figure below.

WLmail will confirm what you want to import (usually you want everything, so All Folders is fine).

When done you get a confirmation message.

Where is your imported mail?

It’s under Storage Folders, then Imported Folder. All your imported mail is there!

From this point . . .

You can literally drag and drop e-mails from the Imported Folder to your Gmail or Hotmail account.

With Hotmail: It’s stupidly easy. You can create folders at whim in your Hotmail account from WLmail and drag/drop whatever you want wherever you want.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Any mail over 10MB in size will not transfer to Hotmail; that is a purposely designed limitation of the system. If you want to move mails over 10MB you need Hotmail Plus and yes, you have to pay for it.

With Gmail: Not stupidly easy. You can’t create folders. In addition you have a [Gmail] folder which isn’t really a folder. “Under” that folder are all the things you see in regular Gmail on the web  – like this:

While folder cannot be created in WLmail, you can create them in the Gmail interface by making what they call “labels”.

It’s done like this:

1. Close your WLmail program (we need to close the app so it synchronizes the next time you launch it).
2. Login to your Gmail account on the web.
3. Create some labels. You’ll see them on the left sidebar in Gmail. It’s green. Click Edit Label, then create some new ones. Any label you create will be seen in WLmail as a folder under [Gmail].

For example, I made a label called I HATE LABELS. This is how it looks in WLmail on re-launch.

At this point I can drag/drop mail into this “folder”.

REMEMBER: Labels/folders cannot be removed via WLmail; you can only do it from the Gmail interface.

How long does it take?

If you have a crapload of mail (and who doesn’t), yes it will take a while. It is strongly recommended not to move more than 300 mails at a time no matter what the size.

Hotmail is the faster of the two because it uses HTTP instead of IMAP. Gmail’s IMAP, while good, can be “moody” at times. However being that the goal is just to get the mail over there it’s okay to deal with until the move is complete.

Can you move mail back if you don’t like Hotmail or Gmail?

Yes you can do this easily.

Also remember that when WLmail imports mail it does not delete the mail from the old client – it’s still there until you go delete it manually.

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