How to export Microsoft To Do

Microsoft To Do has no export button in its apps, and Microsoft’s own export article no longer describes one. There are still three ways to get your lists out. Which one you use depends on what you need the copy for: a backup, a readable record, or a file another app can import.

Understand where your To Do tasks live

Microsoft To Do stores every task in Exchange Online, the same place Outlook keeps mail. Microsoft says the tasks show in both To Do and Outlook Tasks when you sign in to both apps with the same account. That shared store is why every export route runs through Outlook or through Microsoft Graph, the programming interface to that store.

Older forum answers send you to an Export button in Outlook.com settings. Microsoft’s article called “Export your Microsoft To Do lists and tasks” now redirects to Export your Outlook.com mailbox, which asks you to install desktop Outlook and names only email, contacts, and calendar. If a guide shows you a settings screen you cannot find, that is why.

Choose the route that fits

Use classic Outlook when you want a backup you can restore into another Microsoft account. Use Print list when you want to read your lists later, steps included. Use Graph Explorer when the file has to go into another task manager and you do not have classic Outlook. Running two routes is sensible if you have many steps: the JSON moves the tasks and the PDF keeps the steps.

Save your lists as JSON with Graph Explorer

Graph Explorer is Microsoft’s own web page for trying Graph requests. It runs in the browser, uses your own sign-in, and needs only permission to read tasks.

1. Open Graph Explorer and sign in with the account that holds your To Do lists.
2. Set the request to GET and enter https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/me/todo/lists?$expand=tasks.
3. Open the Modify permissions tab and consent to Tasks.Read. Microsoft lists Tasks.Read as the least privileged permission for reading lists on work, school, and personal accounts.
4. Select Run query.
5. Select all the text in the Response preview, copy it, paste it into a plain text editor, and save it as microsoft-to-do.json.

Consent can fail on a work or school account, because the user or an administrator has to grant Graph Explorer its permissions. If yours refuses, ask your IT team or use the Outlook route below.

The response has one entry for each list, including built-in lists such as Tasks and Flagged email, and each entry holds that list’s tasks. Graph stores steps, attachments and linked items separately, so this request leaves them out. The file has no steps, so print any list with steps before you rely on the JSON. My Day is not a task property at all.

Open the file and search for a task title from your longest list. Then compare the number of tasks in one list with the number To Do shows, including completed tasks. If the numbers differ, the file is incomplete: keep To Do as it is, and use the Outlook route or copy the missing tasks by hand.

Back up with classic Outlook for Windows

Classic Outlook for Windows exports a whole account to a .pst file, and the Include subfolders option brings the Tasks folder with it. Choose File → Open & Export → Import/Export → Export to a file → Outlook Data File (.pst), select the account, keep Include subfolders ticked, and save the file.

A .pst file is the backup to keep if you might return to Microsoft or move to another Microsoft account, because Outlook can import it again. Other task managers cannot read it. This route works for a work or school account that is set up in classic Outlook, unless your organisation has turned off .pst files. The Export setting in Outlook.com is a different thing: a Microsoft representative says it works only for personal accounts.

The same wizard offers Comma Separated Values, and a Microsoft moderator describes choosing the Tasks folder for a CSV. Microsoft does not list which To Do fields that CSV keeps, so open it in a spreadsheet and look for your due dates, notes, and completed tasks before trusting it.

New Outlook for Windows has an export under Settings → Files → Export, but Microsoft’s page does not say whether it includes tasks. Legacy Outlook for Mac exports an .olm file, which is made for Outlook for Mac to import.

Print a list with its steps

Print list is the one route Microsoft documents as including your steps. In the To Do app for Windows or To Do on the web, select the three dots beside a list’s title, turn on Print steps and Print notes, and select Print list. Choose a PDF printer to keep a file instead of paper.

Microsoft notes that long task names may be cut off when printed. Print one list at a time, and keep the PDFs beside the JSON. The JSON is what another app imports, and the PDFs are your only copy of the steps.

Import the JSON into Done Bear

Start free and open the Microsoft To Do importer to preview the file before anything is written.

In Done Bear, open Settings → Import and choose Microsoft To Do. Upload the JSON file. Done Bear reads it in your browser and never signs in to Microsoft.

Each list becomes a project, categories become labels, and due dates arrive as all-day deadlines, because To Do has no due time. Notes, completed tasks, and daily, weekly, monthly and yearly repeats carry over, but a repeat’s end date or count is not read, so the repeat keeps going. Reminders, attachments and the Important star stay behind, and the file has no steps to bring. The Microsoft To Do migration guide lists every field.

A task with no date lands in Anytime inside its project, or in the Inbox if you import everything there. A repeat pattern the importer cannot convert is kept as text in the description, with a warning, so no repeating task arrives silently as a one-off.

The preview shows task, project, and label counts before you confirm. Compare them with To Do. The Done Bear import guide covers the destination choices, time zones, running the same file twice, and undo.

Stay on To Do if you plan your day in Outlook and flag emails into tasks. Done Bear doesn’t do either. The Microsoft To Do comparison sets out who should stay and who should move.

Check the export before a work or school account closes

A work or school account can be closed on your last day, and every route here needs you to sign in. Run the export while you still can, then check four things in the file:

• Every list: look for your shared lists and Flagged email as well as your own lists.
• Task counts: compare one long list with the count To Do shows, completed tasks included.
• Due dates: To Do stores each due date as midnight with a time zone attached, and Done Bear reads it as a whole day. Find one task due tomorrow and confirm it still says tomorrow.
• Steps: the JSON has none, so open the PDF for any list whose steps you still need.

Exporting never removes anything from To Do. If the account belongs to your employer, check what you may take with you before you save it.