October 13, 2024
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Posted October 28, 2007 at 8:43pm by iClarified
To transfer your Apple Mail Email and Mail Settings from one Mac to another Mac follow these steps:

Step One
Open a new Finder window by clicking the Finder icon in the dock.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Two
Select Go to Folder from the Go menu at the top of the screen.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac


Step Three
A popup will appear asking you the folder to go to. Enter ~/Library into the entry field and click Go.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Four
Copy the Mail folder and place it into the exact same directory on your destination Mac. The easiest way to do this would be to use a USB Thumb Drive. Select the Mail folder then press Command+c on the keyboard. This will copy it to the clipboard. Then double click the icon for the USB Thumb Drive on your desktop and press Command+v on the keyboard. This will paste the entire mail folder to your USB key.
NOTE***: Note you could also transfer the folder using your network, or you could burn it to CD etc etc.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Five
Again select Go to Folder from the Go menu at the top of the screen.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Six
A popup will appear asking you the folder to go to. Enter ~/Library/Preferences/ into the entry field and click Go.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Seven
Copy com.apple.mail.plist and place it into the exact same directory on your destination Mac. The easiest way to do this would be to use a USB Thumb Drive. Select com.apple.mail.plist folder then press Command+c on the keyboard. This will copy it to the clipboard. Then double click the icon for the USB Thumb Drive on your desktop and press Command+v on the keyboard. This will paste the entire mail folder to your USB key.
NOTE***: Note you could also transfer the folder using your network, or you could burn it to CD etc etc.
How to Transfer Your Email to Another Mac

Step Eight
Once you have placed the Mail folder and com.apple.mail.plist into their correct locations on your destination Mac, your Apple Mail will now open with the exact same settings, folders, and emails as your original Mac had.
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Comments (2)
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Timotius
Timotius - February 18, 2014 at 4:35am
I try the steps for migrating mail from ML to Mavericks, but apple mail still asking to setup mail account and can't read the data. Pls advice
Matt
Matt - April 8, 2013 at 3:44am
Does anybody know if this transfers IMAP settings (server names, etc.) from one Mac that is "correctly" set up and duplicates them on another, such that email send/receive and message save/message delete (IMAP) behaviors will be preserved across the two Macs? FWIW, both are running Mountain Lion.
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