If a user leaves your organization and you want to preserve their Google Workspace data, there are several alternatives for handling their information. This table outlines some options for storing email, Google Calendar events & resources, Google Chat, Google Contacts, Google Drive folders & files, Google Groups, Google Keep, Google Meet recordings, and Google Voice so it’s accessible to certain administrators, managers, or users in your organization.
Note: Administrators also can suspend a user temporarily, which blocks a user's access to your organization's Google services. For more information about what happens to a suspended user's data, go to Suspend a user temporarily .
| Data source / option | Google Takeout | In-app export & import | Data migration service | Google Drive transfer | During user deletion ( 3 ) | Data Export tool | Export with Google Vault | Archived User license |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Who can do it?
|
User | User or admin | Admin | Admin | Admin | Admin | Admin | Admin |
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ | ||||
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ||||
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ | |||||
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ||||||
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ ( 1 )( 2 ) | ✔ | ||
| ✔ | ✔ | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ | |||||
| ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ | ||||||
| ✔ | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ ( 1 ) | ✔ ( 1 ) |
Notes
( 3) When a user leaves your organization, you can delete their account. Super administrators can transfer a user's files and data to a new owner. If you don't transfer the content to another user, the content is deleted.
Export or migrate your data
The selections for each data source listed above are divided by role in more detail below. Additional product and manual migration options for both end users and administrators are also included.
Once the data is migrated, moved, or exported, admins should have access to the former employee’s data provided they have access to the destination account. Any special data access restrictions, such as for Archived User (AU) licenses, are outlined individually.
Note: While the use of these options requires no fee, Google Workspace license fees for the account holding the transferred data are still necessary. This includes AU licenses .
EmailYou can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
You can export events from all your calendars, or just a single calendar, and then import them to another Google Calendar.
You can access the data provided you have access to the calendar, or you’re included on the event.
You can transfer calendars you own to other owners. You can also transfer events to another owner or calendar.
You can access the data provided you have access to the calendar, or you’re included on the event.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
| User option | Learn how | Notes |
|---|---|---|
|
Google Takeout
|
How to download your Google data | You can export your user data. |
|
User or admin options
|
Learn how | Notes |
|
Manual in-app export & import
|
Export and import contacts from Google Contacts | You can export contacts to a CSV file and then import them to a new or existing user account. |
|
Admin options
|
Learn how | Notes |
|
Data Export tool
|
Export your organization's data | You can export all your organization’s users’ data. |
You can download Drive files to your computer and upload them to Drive in a new or existing user account.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
Note: While you can use the Data Export tool to export Keep data, there’s no way to import it into Keep.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
You can export all your organization’s users’ data.
You can maintain your organization’s users’ data by using an AU license.
Google securely maintains the user’s data in standard Google production systems. The data remains preserved by any Vault retention rules and holds set by your organization. You can also search and export it.
Related topics
- Transfer data between Google Workspace accounts
- Let graduating students transfer Google Workspace data
- If you're a software developer, use Google Workspace APIs
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