Summary: This wiki post describes some basic steps on getting started with Office 365, and especially on how to setup your email and first user.
Date: Around 2019
Refactor: 17 January 2025: Checked links and formatting.

In this post the following technologies are discussed:

• Office 365 Trial
• Office 365 Domains
• Office 365 Users
• Office 365 Exchange Online

Note that after a month you need to convert your trial into a subscription. Don't forget or you might face data loss.

Follow these steps to start free trial: https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkID=510938

• Start the Registration by providing your business information
• Now create your user ID. Note that is the name the contract is signed to. I recommend to use a common name like office365@company.onmicrosoft.com
• Then provide your phone number to prove you're human
• After successful verifying your human status the trial is created and you'll get info regarding the sign in page and your user ID.
• Go to the sign in page and sign in. You'll notice that some services like OneDrive and SharePoint are still in the progress of setting up

You are now ready to start using the office 365 environment.

Note that I'm actually migrating my test domain warmetal.nl email towards Office 365 here.

* Log into the Office 365 admin portal and click on Setup and then Domains

• Click on “+ Add Domain”
• Start the New Domain wizard by filling in the email domain you already have and of which you want to move the email to office 365
• Verify the domain by adding a text record in your DNS registration (So perform these steps in the portal of your DNS registrar if possible))
  • Add a TXT record
  • As text, fill in the “TXT value” as provided in the New Domain wizard and save the TXT record
  • It might take a while for the record to work but keep trying by clicking the Verify button. Note that it should take at least 5 minutes but depending on the registrar it could take up to 2 days. For me it took about 10 minutes.
• Back at the wizard, after successfully verifying the domain click the “I'll manage my own DNS records” in the “Set up your online services” part of the wizard and click Next
• Only select Exchange for the online service and click Next
• Add the displayed DNS records at your DNS registrar portal:
  • MX record: warmetal-nl.mail.protection.outlook.com
  • CNAME record: autodiscover: autodiscover.outlook.com
  • TXT record: v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com -all
• And again verify the records. When the records are succesfully verified the wizard is ready and you have added the domain to Office 365

• In the office 365 admin portal go to Users → Active Users → Add a user
• Fill in the required info. Make sure to select the newly added domain under Domain and select the correct license.
• Click Add to create the user

Setup email aliases

• Click the account you just created so a new blade appears
• Under Aliases click “Manage email aliases”
• Add aliases as required and click “Save Changes”

You can now logon using outlook.office.com or using the outlook desktop client or mobile app.

• In the office 365 admin portal go to Users → Active Users → Add a user
• Fill in the required info. Make sure to use the onmicrosoft domain under Domain, assign the global administrator role and select the user to not use a license.

Try to login with the admin account, if successful you can now remove the license from the account which you used to create the Office 365 subscription.

See here for more information about adding a Shared Mailbox

• Exchange Admin Center → Recipients → Shared
• Click the plus sign to add a new one
  • Display name: Warmetal - Info
  • Email address: warmetal@warmetal.nl
  • Users: Sjoerd Hooft

Create, after creation you can add email addresses by going into the properties → Email address → Click +