Convert Apple Mail to standard MBOX files using another approach than the usual ones that involve tedious manual routines and don’t offer best results. If you want to get a large amount of Mail data to standard MBOX files, choose this professional, third-party tool.
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Convert Apple Mail to Standard MBOX
Apple Mail used standard MBOX files for its very first edition. But ever since the second version, it implements EMLX files to store emails. Each EMLX file stores a single email messages and the attachments store in EMLXPART files. This change was made to make index search function faster in Mac OS.
Standard MBOX (*.mbox)
However, if you will go check in the profile folder of Apple Mail (inside ~/Library/Mail/V5), you will indeed find MBOX files. But on a closer look, those are .mbox file packages inside which you will find EMLX files.
Note that .mbox file packages were also used by ‘Mail 1.x’ but there were standard MBOX files inside those packages. Now there are .emlx files.
The thing about these .mbox file packages are that these are not standard MBOX files. They are not files at all, but more like folders, but appear as files. (yes, extensions can be confusing)
In other words, if you have ever downloaded your data from Google services like Gmail (through Google Takeout Option), you will know that the file that Google generates is MBOX file for you to download. That MBOX file from Google is a standard MBOX file that is used by the industry everywhere.
Mac Mail .mbox file packages are not standard files.
Moving MBOX files
This matters because if you want to import these files elsewhere or want another app to open these .mbox file packages, you will not be able to. And it’s pretty much a de-facto procedure to archive data into MBOX or to migrate data using MBOX files because of its compatibility with many programs.
So, if you are looking to get the data into MBOX files, you won’t find it automatically in your Mail database folders. But what’s frustrating is that there is no direct and upfront option to export/archive data from Mac Mail to standard MBOX files. There are procedures that you can go through manually but it will take too long and even then, many report painful errors and issues with them.
Most of the time, the mailbox folders are shown to be converted to MBOX but you will find those folders to be empty.
The best option here is to use a third-party utility that can offer you a smart and effective way to move all Apple Mail data to standard MBOX files.
Tool to Convert Apple Mail to Standard MBOX
“Mail Extractor Max” is a perfect choice for that. It has a basic interface that requires essentially nothing else than you selecting your Mac Mail database folder. It will start backing it all up into standard MBOX files. You can choose if you want a single MBOX file or multiple files smaller in size.
The MBOX files that “Mail Extractor Max” generates has perfectly clean data from the source (Apple Mail). It is compatible with all clients and programs that support MBOX format, for example, Thunderbird. You will get your metadata, images, folders (and their structure), Unicode characters, nested emails, and headers safely converted into MBOX format.
“Mail Extractor Max” also has a lot more to offer than that. Because it is in essence an all-inclusive solution to convert Apple Mail data to various formats. The standard MBOX is one of them. You can convert Apple Mail data to Outlook 2011 Mac, Mac Mail to Thunderbird, Entourage, and Postbox databases. It also converts Mail data to EML files, another generic and commonly accepted file format for email messages.
Get it to convert Apple Mail to Standard MBOX
Try it here. Download the setup, install, and you can use the free trial mode for as long as you want. It has limit up to converting ten items per Apple Mail folder but with full access to all the features.
Get it today to convert Apple Mail to Standard MBOX file format.
