--- title: "Restore Office 365 Mailbox for Free: A Detailed Guide" description: "Learn how to restore Office 365 mailboxes without expensive software in this comprehensive, step-by-step tutorial." canonical: "https://adamtheautomator.com/restore-mailbox-office-365/" --- # Restore Office 365 Mailbox for Free: A Detailed Guide > Learn how to restore Office 365 mailboxes without expensive software in this comprehensive, step-by-step tutorial. Source: https://adamtheautomator.com/restore-mailbox-office-365/ --- ATA Learning Tap to hide [ ATA Learning ](/) * [Home](/) * [Tutorials](/tutorials/) * [Instructors](/author/) * [Advertising](/advertising/) * [Recommended Resources](/resources/) * [About Adam](/about-adam/) Search for: * [](https://twitter.com/adbertram) * [](https://github.com/Adam-the-Automator) * [](https://www.linkedin.com/company/adam-the-automator-llc) * [](/feed/) ![Restore Office 365 Mailbox for Free: A Detailed Guide](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/How-to-Restore-an-Office-365-Mailbox-for-Free.jpg) # Restore Office 365 Mailbox for Free: A Detailed Guide [![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/9a14f10ff1b1ec7d790d34f5b559e4d3de2d31b172e6ef266dfd8b479174d97b?s=192&d=mm&r=g)June Castillote](https://adamtheautomator.com/author/june/)22 April 20207 min. read Categories: [Cloud](/category/cloud/) Tags:[Microsoft Exchange](/tag/microsoft-exchange/)[Office 365](/tag/office-365/) Table of Contents * [Requirements](#requirements) * [“Deleted” Does Not Mean “Gone Forever”](#deleted-does-not-mean-gone-forever) * [Using Office 365 Admin Center to Restore Office 365 Mailbox that is Deleted](#using-office-365-admin-center-to-restore-a-deleted-mailbox) * [Using Azure ActiveDirectory (MSOnline) PowerShell to Restore a Deleted Mailbox](#using-azure-activedirectory-msonline-powershell-to-restore-a-deleted-mailbox) * [Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Recover a Deleted Mailbox](#using-exchange-online-powershell-to-recover-a-deleted-mailbox) * [Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Restore a Deleted Mailbox](#using-exchange-online-powershell-to-restore-a-deleted-mailbox) * [Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Recover an Inactive Mailbox](#using-exchange-online-powershell-to-recover-an-inactive-mailbox) * [Conclusion](#conclusion) * [Further Reading](#further-reading) So an admin just accidentally removed one of your executives’ Office 365 mailboxes or maybe an automation script has gone awry that decided to “clean up” your Office 365 tenant unintentionally. In that case, you’ve got to restore Office 365 mailbox and that’s such a task to do! Why pay big money for expensive software when you can do it for _free_ using some knowledge and a little PowerShell? In this article, you will learn the different ways to restore or recover a deleted mailbox in Office 365 with real, step-by-step examples. ## Requirements This article will follow a _How-To_ approach. If you plan to follow along with the examples, these are the requirements that must be in place. * A computer with Windows 10. * Windows PowerShell 5.1. * An Office 365 Tenant. If you don’t have this yet or if you want to set up a test tenant, you can request for an _[Office 365 Trial](https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkID=698279&culture=en-US&country=US)_. * A global admin or user management admin account in Office 365. This is required to restore a mailbox. * The _[Exchange Online PowerShell V2 module](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/exchange/exchange-online/exchange-online-powershell-v2/exchange-online-powershell-v2?view=exchange-ps#install-and-maintain-the-exchange-online-powershell-v2-module)_ must be installed. * The _[Azure ActiveDirectory (MSOnline) module](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/active-directory/install-msonlinev1?view=azureadps-1.0)_ must be installed. ## “Deleted” Does Not Mean “Gone Forever” When an Office 365 mailbox is deleted, it is not immediately removed. The deleted mailbox is only hidden and moved to the _Soft Deleted Objects_ container in Office 365. At this point, the mailbox is considered as a _[Soft-Deleted](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/recipients-in-exchange-online/delete-or-restore-mailboxes#soft-deleted-user-mailboxes) mailbox._ A soft-deleted mailbox is available for recovery within 30 days. After 30 days, the soft-deleted mailbox will be _[Hard-Deleted](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/recipients-in-exchange-online/delete-or-restore-mailboxes#hard-deleted-user-mailboxes)_ or purged. Once the mailbox has been purged, recovery is no longer possible. However, if a mailbox was put in _[litigation hold](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/security-and-compliance/in-place-and-litigation-holds)_ before it was deleted, the mailbox will become an _inactive mailbox_ and will not be purged, indefinitely. When you attempt to restore or recover a mailbox in Office 365, note that only _Soft-Deleted (including inactive)_ mailboxes can be restored or recovered. _Hard-Deleted_ mailboxes are permanently deleted and are not recoverable. These statements aren’t meant to confuse you but to let you know you _can_ get mailboxes back under just about any circumstance! ## Using Office 365 Admin Center to Restore Office 365 Mailbox that is Deleted Before going any further, please make sure that your Office 365 account is assigned with a global admin or user management admin privileges in Office 365. Otherwise, the following steps will not work for you. > _Note: The Office 365 Admin Center is now known as the Microsoft 365 Admin Center. But, for the sake of familiarity, we will still refer to it as the Office 365 Admin Center._ Restoring deleted mailboxes can be done from the Office 365 Admin Center. To do so, follow these steps. First, using your browser, navigate to the _[Office 365 Admin Center](https://portal.office.com/adminportal),_ and log in using your admin account. Then, on the navigation menu on the left of the page, go to **Users —> Deleted Users**. ![Opening the Deleted Users page](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T154946.072.png) Opening the Deleted Users page Then, on the **Deleted user** page, you should see a list of the deleted users that are still available to be recovered. From the list, you can select one or more deleted users and click on the **Restore user** button. In the example below, the deleted user with username _[TestAcct1@poshlab.ml](mailto:TestAcct1@poshlab.ml)_ Is selected to be restored. ![Selecting one deleted user to be restored](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T155046.182.png) Selecting one deleted user to be restored The **Restore** flyout will show up to present you with options before restoring the mailbox. As you can see from the below, the restoration advises you to make sure that there’s an available product license that will be assigned for the restored user.confirmation page, as Restoring the mailbox will perform the following actions: * Restore all associated data. * Assign product licenses. * Give access to all services that the user can access before. Select the options that you deem appropriate or that are compliant with your organization’s policies. After making your selections, click the **Restore** button. ![Select options before restoring the mailbox](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T155917.015.png) Select options before restoring the mailbox Once the restore operation is complete, you will get a confirmation page as shown below. You can choose to send the new password by email, then click on **Send email and close**. ![Confirmed user restoration](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160450.636.png) Confirmed user restoration Once done, an email with the user login details that you can then share with the user, similar to the image below. ![User account details in an email message](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160509.189.png) User account details in an email message Optionally, you can confirm that the mailbox is restored by checking in the _[Exchange Admin Center](https://outlook.office365.com/ecp)_. As you can see from the screenshot below, the mailbox _[TestAcct1@poshlab.ml](mailto:TestAcct1@poshlab.ml)_ is listed under the available mailboxes list. ![Mailbox is restored](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160524.130.png) Mailbox is restored ## Using Azure ActiveDirectory (MSOnline) PowerShell to Restore a Deleted Mailbox You must have already installed the MSOnline module as a requirement before you can run any of the commands in this section. First, you must _[connect to Azure AD using PowerShell](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/active-directory/install-msonlinev1?view=azureadps-1.0#connect-to-azure-ad)_. Then, to know details of the user that will be restored, run the command: ```powershell Get-MsolUser -ReturnDeletedUsers | Select-Object ObjectID,UserPrincipalName,isLicensed ``` When you run the code above, you should get the list of the deleted users that are available for restoration. Take note of the `ObjectID` value of the user that you need to restore. See the screenshot below as an example. ![Finding the ObjectID of the mailbox](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160742.594.png) Finding the ObjectID of the mailbox Then, once you’ve selected the deleted user, you can restore it by using the command below. Make sure to change the `` with the actual `ObjectID`of the user object. ```powershell Restore-MsolUser -ObjectId -AutoReconcileProxyConflicts ``` Once you run the command above in PowerShell, you should see a similar output, as shown below. In this example, the deleted user to be restored is _[Test.Mailbox@poshlab.ml](mailto:Test.Mailbox@poshlab.ml)_. ![Command to restore a deleted user](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160814.917.png) Command to restore a deleted user Then, you can run this next command to confirm that the user was restored as an active user. ```powershell Get-MsolUser -ObjectId ``` \-OR- ```powershell Get-MsolUser -UserPrincipalName ``` As you can see from the screenshot below, the restored user is found. ![Restored user is found](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160839.553.png) Restored user is found Lastly, to confirm that the mailbox has been restored as well, you can either go to the _[Exchange Admin Center](https://outlook.office365.com/ecp)_ or _[Connect to Exchange Online PowerShell](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/exchange/exchange-online/exchange-online-powershell-v2/exchange-online-powershell-v2?view=exchange-ps#connect-to-exchange-online-using-the-exo-v2-module)_. If you prefer to check the mailbox via PowerShell, run this command: ```powershell Get-Mailbox -Identity ``` The screenshot below shows that the mailbox of the restored user has been restored as well. ![The mailbox was restored](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160858.871.png) The mailbox was restored ## Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Recover a Deleted Mailbox Using the Exchange Online [PowerShell module](https://adamtheautomator.com/powershell-modules/ "PowerShell module"), you can also recover a mailbox using just a few commands. In this example, it is assumed that the user account has been deleted, which caused the mailbox to become a soft-deleted mailbox. First, get the mailbox identity of the soft-deleted mailbox you intend to restore using the command below. ```powershell Get-Mailbox -SoftDeletedMailbox | Select-Object UserPrincipalName ``` After running the above command, you should get a list showing the list of the soft-deleted mailboxes with the `UserPrincipalName` property values. In this example, the mailbox to be restored is the one with the name _[TestAcct1@poshlab.ml](mailto:TestAcct1@poshlab.ml)_. Next, run this command below to recover the mailbox. Make sure to replace the `` with the actual value of the mailbox `UserPrincipalName`. ```powershell Undo-SoftDeletedMailbox ` -WindowsLiveID ` -Password ` (ConvertTo-SecureString -String 'NewP@$w0rd' -AsPlainText -Force) ``` Once you run the command above, a new user account will be created and the recovered mailbox is linked to the new account. See the example below. ![The mailbox was recovered.](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T160929.154.png) The mailbox was recovered. > _Note: After the mailbox is recovered, you need to assign a product license to the user. Otherwise, the mailbox will be disabled after the 30-day grace period has passed._ ## Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Restore a Deleted Mailbox Restoring a soft-deleted mailbox means that you are essentially copying the contents of the soft-deleted mailbox to another mailbox. Note that in this example, the source mailbox is called _TestAcct,_ and the target mailbox is called _reports._ To restore the contents of the soft-deleted mailbox, you first need to get two values. * The Exchange of the soft-deleted mailbox (source) ```powershell Get-Mailbox -SoftDeletedMailbox | Select-Object Name,ExchangeGUID ``` ![Get the ExchangeGUID of the target mailbox](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161004.683.png) Get the ExchangeGUID of the target mailbox * The ExchangeGUID of the new mailbox (target) ```powershell Get-Mailbox | Select-Object Name,ExchangeGUID ``` ![Get the ExchangeGUID of the target mailbox](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161028.897.png) Get the ExchangeGUID of the target mailbox Once you have the required ExchangeGUID values, you can initiate the restore using the command below. Make sure to change the `` and `` with the actual `ExchangeGUID` values of the source and target mailboxes. ```powershell New-MailboxRestoreRequest ` -SourceMailbox ` -TargetMailbox ` -AllowLegacyDNMismatch ``` After running the command, you should see a confirmation that the restore request has been _Queued._ See the screenshot for reference. ![Create the mailbox restore request](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161054.611.png) Create the mailbox restore request While waiting for the completion, you can monitor the progress by running this command below. ```powershell Get-MailboxRestoreRequest | Get-MailboxRestoreRequestStatistics ``` The output of the command above is similar to the screenshot below. ![Monitoring the mailbox restore request progress](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161117.384.png) Monitoring the mailbox restore request progress ## Using Exchange Online PowerShell to Recover an Inactive Mailbox An _inactive mailbox_ is a type of soft-deleted mailbox that was put in _[litigation hold](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/security-and-compliance/in-place-and-litigation-holds)_ before it entered the soft-deleted state. When an inactive mailbox is recovered, a new user account is created, and the inactive mailbox is linked to it. Before you can recover an inactive mailbox, first, you need to get the ExchangeGUID of the inactive mailbox. Use the command below to get the inactive mailbox details. Note that the `InactiveMailboxOnly` parameter ensures that only inactive mailboxes are returned. ```powershell Get-Mailbox -InactiveMailboxOnly | Format-List Name,DistinguishedName,ExchangeGuid,PrimarySmtpAddress ``` After running the command above, you should see the list of inactive mailboxes. Then, find the ExchangeGUID of the inactive mailbox you wish to recover. See the screenshot below as a reference. ![Inactive mailbox properties](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161143.946.png) Inactive mailbox properties The syntax below shows the minimum required set of parameters to recover an inactive mailbox. ```powershell New-Mailbox ` -InactiveMailbox ` -Name ` -FirstName ` -LastName ` -DisplayName ` -MicrosoftOnlineServicesID ` -Password (ConvertTo-SecureString -String 'NewP@$w0rd' -AsPlainText -Force) ` -ResetPasswordOnNextLogon $true ``` Using the syntax above, replace the `, , , , ` values. After you’ve replaced the appropriate values, run the command in PowerShell as shown below. ![The inactive mailbox was recovered and linked to a new user](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Untitled-2020-05-19T161204.788.png) The inactive mailbox was recovered and linked to a new user > _Note: After an inactive mailbox is recovered, you need to assign a product license to the user. Otherwise, the mailbox will be disabled after the 30-day grace period has passed._ After completing the recovery, you can confirm that the new mailbox is available by checking in the Exchange admin center or PowerShell as was done in the previous examples. And, if your company policy permits, _[access the mailbox using Outlook or Outlook on the Web (OWA)](https://support.office.com/en-us/article/access-another-person-s-mailbox-a909ad30-e413-40b5-a487-0ea70b763081)_. ## Conclusion There are several ways to either recover or restore a deleted mailbox in Office 365. These recovery and restore capabilities are built-in to Office 365 and are free to use. Each method of mailbox restore can be used in specific scenarios where they may apply. Some methods are available in the Office 365 portal, while most are available through the use of PowerShell modules and scripts. It is up to you to determine which method you deem appropriate to use for the conditions you may encounter when restoring Office 365 mailboxes. ## Further Reading * **_[Delete or restore user mailboxes in Exchange Online](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/recipients-in-exchange-online/delete-or-restore-mailboxes)_** * **_[Recover an inactive mailbox](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/compliance/recover-an-inactive-mailbox?view=o365-worldwide)_** * **_[Connecting to Exchange Online PowerShell](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/exchange/exchange-online/exchange-online-powershell-v2/exchange-online-powershell-v2?view=exchange-ps#connect-to-exchange-online-using-the-exo-v2-module)_** * **_[Connecting to Azure AD PowerShell](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/active-directory/install-msonlinev1?view=azureadps-1.0#connect-to-azure-ad)_** Share this article [Share on X](https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Frestore-mailbox-office-365%2F&text=Restore%20Office%20365%20Mailbox%20for%20Free%3A%20A%20Detailed%20Guide)[Share on Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Frestore-mailbox-office-365%2F)[Share on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Frestore-mailbox-office-365%2F) ## Related Posts ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/microsoft_office_logo_press_image_1200x800-100751542-large.jpg) ### [Connect Azure AD to Office 365: Install Azure AD Connect](/connect-azure-ad-to-office-365/) Discover how to connect Azure AD to Office 365, install Azure AD Connect, and enable directory synchronization for your tenancy. ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/key-2114293_1280.jpg) ### [Enable MFA in Office 365: A Hands-On, Step-by-Step Guide](/office-365-mfa/) Learn how to set up and enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) in Office 365 with this comprehensive, hands-on tutorial. ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/keyboard-155722_1280.jpg) ### [Delete Email from All Office 365 Mailboxes: Step-by-Step](/office-365-delete-email/) Use Security and Compliance PowerShell cmdlets to search and delete email from all Office 365 mailboxes and prevent attacks. ## Categories * [IT Ops](/category/it-ops/) * [Cloud](/category/cloud/) * [DevOps](/category/devops/) * [Home Ops](/category/home-ops/) * [Information Security](/category/infosec/) * [Software Development](/category/software-development/) ## Site * [Home](/) * [Tutorials](/tutorials/) * [Instructors](/author/) * [Advertising](/advertising/) * [Recommended Resources](/resources/) * [About Adam](/about-adam/) Copyright 2026© ATA Learning | [Privacy Policy](/privacy/)