Exchange cutover - AD Connect being synced for 365 licensing

Question

Hi,

Is it possible to do an exchange cutover migration with azure synced to an on premise AD? Using Microsoft or any other third party software? We have an exchange server, AD is synced with 'entra' due to office 365 licensing. We're wanting to go to exchange online and have E3 licenses for it. It's my understanding that AD Sync has to be turned off.

If we disabled the directory sync, how would that impact on prem user licensing for 365 apps that are being used? If their passwords expire every X days, what would happen if we disabled the sync, a users password expires on prem, then office365 apps tries to sync back to entra and fails to due to the sync being broken?

If anyone has any extensive information on this, it would be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

Hi @Jason Smith ,

Welcome to our Q&A forum!

Is it possible to do an exchange cutover migration with azure synced to an on premise AD?

Yes, it is possible to perform an Exchange cutover migration with Azure synced to an on-premise AD. However, it is important to note that DirSync is not supported for cutover migration. The correct way to do this is to perform the cutover first and only enable DirSync after the migration has been completed.

If we disabled the directory sync, how would that impact on prem user licensing for 365 apps that are being used?

If you disable directory sync, the user licensing for 365 apps that are being used will not be impacted. However, if a user’s password expires on-premises and the sync is broken, the user will not be able to access Office 365 apps until the password is updated.

Related post you can refer to: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/answers/questions/702731/exchange-cutover-migration-will-work-with-aad-conn

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