How to Take a Backup from Exchange Online in Microsoft 365?

Hello everyone,

I’m planning to implement a reliable backup strategy for our organization’s mailboxes in Exchange Online (Microsoft 365). We currently rely on Microsoft’s built-in retention and litigation hold, but I’d like to maintain our own off-site copy in case of accidental deletion, compliance audits, or ransomware recovery.

What I’ve considered so far:

eDiscovery exports via the Security & Compliance Center (manual, time-consuming for large tenants)

PowerShell scripts using New-ComplianceSearch / New-MailboxExportRequest (requires on-prem or hybrid file share)

Third-party tools like Shoviv Office 365 Backup Software)

Questions for the community:

Best practices – What process have you found most reliable for full and incremental backups of Exchange Online mailboxes?

Automation – Are there PowerShell modules or REST APIs you recommend for scheduling exports without an on-prem server?

Data format & retention – Which export formats (PST, MSG, EML, etc.) work best for long-term storage and quick recovery?

Third-party experiences – If you’ve used a backup solution, how does it handle throttling, large mailboxes, and restores?

Any advice, sample scripts, or tool recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Read more:

1. Download Emails from Outlook
2. Export Microsoft 365 mailbox
3. Archive emails in Outlook 365