Microsoft has released the latest policy for OneDrive unlicensed users as of January 27, 2025. Under the policy, accounts that remain unlicensed for more than 93 days will be archived for the user or organization.
It divides in two different timelines
Deadline before 17 February
Unarchived OneDrive user accounts will be archived on May 16, 2025. Prior to this date, opening or accessing the account will result in an Incomplete status.
Deadline after 17 February
Here the user will have some time to re-stabilize the account or use it on an earlier basis. Otherwise: After 60 days, the account will be in read-only mode and after 93 days, it will be archived (retention policy is kept) or moved to trash (retention policy is not kept).
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Why has the Microsoft storage policy been updated?
Nowadays everyone is transferring their data to cloud storage and Microsoft is the first choice of many organizations. But it is a big deal for Microsoft to handle a large amount of storage or unlicensed OneDrive accounts. So, Microsoft changed its policy and apply some charges to the organization so that unwanted accounts are deleted, and cloud storage can be kept healthy.
Download Unlicensed OneDrive account reports in CSV
If you want to know how many OneDrive users are involved in business without any license and what is the size of the data, you can follow the below steps.
- Go to browse and login to Microsoft admin center.
- Go to admin panel then scroll down and choose SharePoint admin center.
- Navigate to reports > OneDrive account
- Click on Download reports in CSV file.
Options to Manage Unlicensed OneDrive User accounts
Here user have two state to recover unlicensed OneDrive User accounts.
(A) Before Archiving
Option 1: Assign a License
Assign a license to an unlicensed OneDrive account with the minimum Microsoft subscription plan that has access to OneDrive. This will allow the user to access and work with the files without any complications, and the administrator can modify settings and policies.
Option 2: Delete OneDrive Account
Delete the unlicensed user account with their work from the organization. Removing account and data, will go to recycle bin and after 93 days it will remove permanently.
Option 3: Archive Account
If the administrator takes no action, the account will be archived via Microsoft Archived and access to the file and account will be allowed until the time limit is reached.
(B) After Archiving
Option 1: Assign License
As an account holder or site collection administrator, you can request your organization to provide a valid license, and account will be re-active within 48 hours. If user or identity is not associated with account, then reactive it before data will be removed.
Option 2: Delete Account
Without activation, a OneDrive account can be deleted from the archive. But accounts that are under a retention policy cannot delete an unlicensed OneDrive account directly.
How to Access Archive Unlicensed accounts?
As we know the Read state and Archive state are set to different time periods. So when your data is in read-only mode, the admin can add a license to use the account or use PowerShell to unlock the site.
When the account is in archive, it needs to be reactivated via Microsoft Archive.
Charges to Activate account from Microsoft archive
In the future, if an administrator needs to activate an unlicensed OneDrive account, you will need to pay some fees when billing is enabled.
Re-activation charges: $0.60 per GB (one time)
Storage charges: $0.05 per GB per month
For example: 1 user with 10 GB data
10 * $0.60 = $6.00 (activation charges)
10 * $0.05 = 0.50 (Storage Charges – This will be applicable every month)
Total cost: $6.50.
You can now easily evaluate and activate unlicensed OneDrive accounts for your organization from archived status. If your account is unarchived, you can assign licenses or permanently delete unwanted accounts.
Conclusion
Here I have shared detailed information about how to activate, delete and archive unused OneDrive account. Many companies and organizations have huge number of users and data left on the cloud without any need. So, this update clarifies their approach and importantly explains what the latest update in Microsoft storage policy is.
If you need more details, you can visit Microsoft official site. Contact MailsDaddy for more cloud support, migration and backup solutions.
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