Google to 365 - FAQ

The University had offered faculty, staff, and students two platforms for communication and collaboration – Google Workspace and Microsoft 365.  Both service frameworks were available to everyone at UConn, with the exception of email and calendaring.  For technical reasons, student email was hosted on Google (Gmail) and faculty and staff on Microsoft 365 (Outlook).  Community preferences and certain security and management considerations had resulted in students primarily using Google apps to create and store files, while employees had been more strongly associated with Microsoft 365. 

Having our community on two different platforms caused problems. Files and the technology are largely incompatible, which impeded file sharing, collaboration, and full use of features.  People often switched back and forth between the two, disparate systems.  The university supported both, despite the challenges, because of those preferences and because Google historically offered educational institutions free and unlimited storage.  This changed in 2022 when Google unilaterally changed their terms and conditions.  The institutional relationship is now effectively no better than a personal relationship. It is no longer free, and the expense scales with usage.  For a large university with substantial storage needs, the cost is significant, and hard caps/quotas are necessary.  Further, Google expenses are duplicative of the university's existing and ongoing enterprise relationship with Microsoft.  

After carefully considering cost, security, capabilities, and complexity, we made the difficult decision to unify UConn onto a single feature rich platform by phasing out Google and transitioning students to Microsoft 365. 

For additional information and a detailed timeline for the transition, visit: its.uconn.edu/google-to-microsoft-365-transition

“Microsoft 365” or simply “365” is the umbrella term for Microsoft’s software suite. This suite was formerly known as “Office”, such as “Office 2016” or “Office 2019”, and then “Office 365”. Microsoft then created “Microsoft 365” to include the Windows operating system (OS) itself.

Microsoft 365 includes, but is not limited to, the following programs and services: Windows, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneDrive, SharePoint, Outlook, Delve, Stream, etc.

All university email accounts created on or after January 11th, 2024 are in outlook.com. This includes all students, faculty, and staff who joined the university after January 11th.

For additional information and a detailed timeline for the transition of accounts created before January 11th, visit: its.uconn.edu/google-to-microsoft-365-transition

Please visit Overview of Changes and Impacts to learn more about the data migrations.

Please visit this site for an up-to-date timeline: https://its.uconn.edu/google-to-microsoft-365-transition/

File Migration: What will and what won't migrate

Yes. Please visit Google Shared Drives - Migration for more information.