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Moving from a Windows machine to a Mac? Here’s what you need to know
If you’re an Office 365 subscriber, you can transfer your Office licence from your PC to your Mac.
WindowsPCs and Macs run completely different operating systems, so there’s always going to be some adjustment when it comes to moving from PC to Mac. But it’s easier than ever before to move your essential documents, photos and other files from one to the other.
In many cases you don’t need to move anything. If your email is Gmail, your messages aren’t stored on your computer; they live in the cloud, and you can access them in Safari just as you did in Edge. You can also add Gmail to the Mail app on macOS by going to Mail > Add Account. It takes about one minute. It’s the same with Google Docs and other cloud-based services.
One of the biggest differences when you move from a Windows PC to a Mac is that not all of the apps are the same. However, that’s much less of a problem than it used to be: all the key apps such as Edge, Chrome, Firefox, Steam, Microsoft Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and so on are also available on the Mac. Although you can’t usually transfer the licence for a paid PC app to a Mac one, there are exceptions: if you’re an Office 365 subscriber, go to office.com/myaccount on your Mac and look for Install > Install Information and deactivate your Windows PC. You can now install Office on your Mac and use the same licence. Similarly if you’re an Adobe Creative Cloud subscriber your subscription is linked to you, not your computer.