Dealing with Mail in "On My Mac" folders for a clean install

I’m prepping, backing up, etc.my old computer so I can do a clean install on the new Mini that will be arriving soon.:grin:

My question is to what to do with Mail.app email that is filed in On My Mac folders.

One solution for much of it has been to create server based folders and move stuff there, so it will download onto the new computer.

I’ve also cold-storage archived some by saving them to Rich Text documents.

That leaves still thousands of emails that I don’t want to archive since I may need to access them on occasion, but I also don’t want to clutter up my server. I’m guessing that I should export mbox files and then import them to the new computer, as tedious as this task may be, it’s served in the past.
Or maybe there’s no such thing as cluttering up your server?

Wondering if anyone has more efficient workflows on getting old mail to a clean install computer.

1 Like

In Mail, select the folder, right-click, select “Export Mailbox” and export it to a location of your choosing.

On the new mac, file>import mailboxes…

You could also dig around in ~/Library/Mail but it can be a bit inscrutable, and thus bit of a guessing game as to whether you’ve got the correct contents.

+1 for the solution of @Scottisloud
Or just copy the specific mailbox folder off the machine and copy back afterwards

And ,aube, just maybe, copy it off, and leave it there?
Just to see if you need it?