How to export Proton Mail emails and contacts, step by step

Proton gives you a free tool that downloads your whole mailbox to your computer, and a separate button for contacts. Neither is hard, but the mail tool runs in a terminal window, which catches people off guard. Here is each route, who can use it, and how to check what you got.

How do you export Proton Mail emails?

Download the Proton Mail Export Tool for Windows, macOS or Linux, run it, sign in with your Proton username and password, type B for backup and pick a folder. It saves every email as an EML file with its metadata in JSON files. Proton says the tool is available for everyone, free plan included.

To export contacts, open Contacts on the web, select all, and choose Export selection as .VCF.

Your options at a glance

What you want	Proton's route	Who can use it	What you get
The whole mailbox	Proton Mail Export Tool	Everyone	EML files plus JSON metadata
One or two messages	Export from the message's More menu	Everyone	A single email file
Mail inside Outlook, Thunderbird or Apple Mail	Proton Mail Bridge	Paid Proton Mail plans	Mail in your email client, which can then export
Your address book	Contacts, Export selection as .VCF	Everyone	One .vcf (vCard) file

Each of these comes from Proton's own guide to importing and exporting emails. For most people the first row is the one to use.

Before you run the Export Tool

The Export Tool page lists these minimum system requirements:

Windows 10
macOS 10.15 on Intel Macs, or macOS 11.0 on Apple Silicon
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Proton also asks you to check three things first. You need enough free disk space for everything stored in your Proton account. You need a stable internet connection. And you need time, because the export "can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours on larger inboxes."

That last point matters more than it sounds. The tool's FAQ says you cannot pause an export and resume it later. If your laptop sleeps or the Wi-Fi drops halfway, you start again. Plug in the charger, turn off sleep for the session, and run it when you will not need to close the lid.

Export your mail with the Export Tool

Download and extract. On the Export Tool page, pick the download for your system. When it finishes, extract the archive to a folder of your choice.
Launch it. Open that folder and double-click the file called proton-mail-export-cli. On Linux you may need to run it from a terminal opened in that folder, with ./proton-mail-export-cli.
Sign in. A terminal window opens and asks for your Proton Mail username. Type it and press Enter. Then type your password and press Enter. The password stays invisible while you type, which is normal. If you use two-factor authentication or a separate mailbox password, the tool asks for that next.
Choose backup. The tool offers two operations. Type B (or Backup) and press Enter.
Pick where it saves. The tool asks whether to use the default location, which is a new folder named after your Proton username inside the folder where the tool sits. Type yes to accept, or no to type a different path.
Wait for "Export finished". A progress bar shows how far along it is. When the terminal says Export finished, you can close the window.

There are no menus or buttons at any stage. Everything is a typed answer and the Enter key. If you have not used a terminal before, read each prompt before you answer it.

What the second option, restore, is for

Typing R instead of B restores a backup into a Proton account. Proton's page is clear that restore only accepts emails exported with the tool's own backup and "is not intended to import other emails." It is a way to put a Proton backup back into Proton, not a general importer.

Export a single email

For one receipt or one contract, the tool is overkill. Proton's import and export guide describes a button for this that everyone can use:

Sign in at mail.proton.me and open the email.
Under the sender details, click the three dots (More) icon.
Select Export.
Choose a location on your device and click Save.

Export through Proton Mail Bridge

Bridge is the other route Proton documents, and the right one if you want mail inside a desktop email client. Proton says Bridge "is available to anyone with a paid Proton Mail plan."

Proton explains on its why you need Bridge page that stored mail is encrypted in a way a normal IMAP connection cannot read. Bridge runs on your computer, downloads your mail, decrypts it locally, and offers it to your email client through IMAP and SMTP servers that only apps on the same device can reach.

The steps, from Proton's Bridge install page and its MBOX and EML guide:

Download and install Proton Mail Bridge, open it, and sign in with your Proton account.
Pick your email client in Bridge's setup wizard (Outlook, Thunderbird or Apple Mail) and follow the configuration steps it shows.
Wait for the mail to finish syncing. In Thunderbird, the progress bar disappears when it is done.
Export from the client. In Thunderbird, open a folder, select all messages with Ctrl+A (Cmd+A on a Mac), right-click and choose Save as… to save them as EML files.

Bridge has one trick the Export Tool lacks: selective exports. Proton's guide shows how to right-click a folder in Thunderbird (or All Mail for everything), choose Search Messages…, set a filter such as a date range, tick Run search on server, and click Save as Search Folder. Open that new folder, select all, and save as EML. The search folder lives only in Thunderbird and does not sync back to Proton.

If you just want a full copy of your mail, Proton itself recommends the Export Tool over Bridge for backups.

How do you export contacts from Proton Mail?

Contacts are not part of the mail export. Proton's Contacts help page gives two ways to get them out.

All contacts at once:

Sign in at account.proton.me and click the Contacts icon in the right sidebar.
Tick the check box that selects all contacts.
Click … and choose Export selection as .VCF.
Your contacts are decrypted in the browser, then you save the file to your downloads folder.

One contact:

Sign in at mail.proton.me and click the Contacts icon at the top right.
Click the contact.
Click the Export icon at the top right of the contact details. It saves as a .vcf file.

Proton describes contact export on the web. Its page on Contacts in the mobile app covers viewing, searching, messaging and calling contacts, so use a browser on a computer for this step.

The .vcf (vCard) format is the one most address books and mail services accept. Proton's page also suggests exporting your contacts from time to time even if you are staying, because resetting your password can leave contact details encrypted with no way to decrypt them. A recent .vcf file is the backup Proton tells you to keep.

What the export does not include

The Export Tool's FAQ says it "only lets you export your Proton Mail emails." It does not export:

Contacts. Use the .vcf export above.
Proton Calendar events.
Proton Drive files.
Proton Pass items. Pass has its own export in its settings.

If you use more than one Proton app, each one needs its own export, so list them before you start and tick them off as you go.

Check the export before you rely on it

An export you have never opened is a guess. Five minutes of checking turns it into a backup.

Find the folder. If you accepted the default, it is the folder named after your Proton username, next to the tool itself.
Check the size. A mailbox of several years should produce a folder of many megabytes at least. A folder of a few kilobytes means something stopped early.
Open a few EML files. Pick one old message, one recent one and one with an attachment. Double-click each; your computer opens EML files in its default mail app. Check the sender, date and body look right.
Look for the JSON files. They hold each message's metadata. You do not need to read them, but if they are missing, run the export again.
Store a second copy. Copy the folder to an external drive.

For contacts, open the .vcf in your computer's address book app, or simply check the file is larger than a few bytes and count a few names you know should be there.

Frequently asked questions

Is the Proton Mail Export Tool free? Yes. Proton's help page says the tool is available for everyone, and its import and export guide makes no plan distinction for it. Bridge is the route that needs a paid plan.

What format does Proton Mail export to? The Export Tool saves each email as an EML file and its metadata as JSON. Contacts export as a .vcf (vCard) file. Through Bridge, your email client decides the format; Thunderbird saves EML files.

Can I export Proton Mail from my phone? Proton's export steps all use a computer: the Export Tool runs on Windows, macOS and Linux, and contact export is described on the web. Use a computer for both.

Does exporting delete my emails from Proton? No. The Export Tool and Bridge download copies. Your mail stays in your Proton account until you delete it.

Can I import the EML files into another email service? Proton says EML messages can be imported into email clients such as Thunderbird or Outlook, and many mail services accept EML files directly. Check your new provider's import page for the formats it takes.

Moving the export to Secria

If the export is headed for a new inbox, Secria Mail has a guided Import from Proton under Settings, then Import & export, then Bring mail in. You save your mail as EML with Proton's Export Tool and drop the files in. Mail is read and encrypted in your browser before upload, original dates are kept, and import works on every plan, the free one included. Your contacts .vcf can come too, since Secria imports contacts from a CSV or vCard file. The Proton Mail alternative page shows how the two compare, and our guide to switching email providers covers forwarding and updating logins.

Whatever you do next, open the export folder once before you need it, and keep a copy somewhere other than the laptop that made it.