What's the OneDrive web download limit?

The OneDrive web client lets you select files and folders and click Download — but the resulting zip has hard limits: 20 GB total size and 10,000 items, whichever you hit first. If your school OneDrive is bigger, you'll need either multiple selective downloads or a tool that streams without buffering the whole zip on Microsoft's side.

Can I just sync OneDrive to my home laptop?

Sometimes. If your school's IT policy allows it, install the OneDrive desktop client on a personal laptop and sign in with your school account; it will sync your OneDrive locally. Two caveats: it can take days for a large drive, and the moment your account is deactivated the local cache disappears too (sync removes 'orphaned' files).

Does mydocs.school have the same 20 GB limit?

No. We stream files into the zip as it travels to your browser, so the per-zip cap is only as large as your free disk space. We do have an upper file count of around 30,000 per export, which is more than enough for almost any individual OneDrive.

What about shared files and SharePoint sites?

Files owned by someone else and shared with you are technically not yours to keep. mydocs.school only includes files you have personal ownership of. Same rule applies to OneDrive web download — you can usually download a copy of shared files, but you don't own them and shouldn't assume that copy stays available.

Export · OneDrive

Export your school OneDrive in one go.

OneDrive is the easiest Microsoft 365 surface to export — until you hit the 20 GB / 10,000-file ceiling, at which point it gets fiddly. Here's every realistic path, including the one we built.

The three honest paths

1. OneDrive web download (free, has limits)

Sign in to onedrive.live.com with your school account, navigate to the folder you want, select all, click Download. Microsoft builds a zip on the server and streams it to you. Hard limits: 20 GB per zip and 10,000 items per zip. Hit either and the zip either fails to start or truncates silently. For a drive larger than that, you'll need to do it in pieces — folder by folder, manually keeping track of what you've already exported.

2. OneDrive desktop sync (free, slow, account-bound)

Install the OneDrive desktop client on a personal computer. Sign in with your school account. The client will sync your OneDrive locally — for a large drive, this can take hours or days. The critical caveat: once your school deactivates your account, the client will mark the files as orphaned and may remove them. Copy them out of the OneDrive folder to a separate location as soon as sync finishes.

Some schools' IT policies block the desktop client from installing on personal devices via Conditional Access. Check before relying on this path.

3. mydocs.school (one click, no limits in practice)

Sign in with your school Microsoft account. The dashboard shows your OneDrive root with size and item count. One click and a zip starts streaming to your browser — bypassing the 20 GB ceiling because we don't buffer the whole zip on the server side. Files stream through our service to your browser; nothing is retained.

You also get every personal and class OneNote notebook attached to your account in the same dashboard, which the OneDrive web download will never give you.

What gets included

Every file in your personal OneDrive root.
Every folder, preserved with the same structure.
Files you own that you've put inside shared folders (we re-check ownership before adding).
Office files in their native format (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx) — no conversion, no lossy export.

What's not included

Files shared with you that you don't personally own — these belong to the original author and aren't yours to export.
SharePoint site documents — see /export/sharepoint-documents.
Files in deleted folders that are still in your OneDrive recycle bin — restore them first, then export.

Tips before you start

Use a laptop on Wi-Fi, not a phone on data. A full school OneDrive can be 5–10 GB.
Run the export before your last day. Your account is still active and your school's Wi-Fi tends to be faster than home.
Save the zip to two places. A personal laptop plus an external drive, or plus a personal Google Drive. One copy isn't a backup.
Take OneNote at the same time. It's the workload most students lose and the hardest to get back.

Common questions

What's the OneDrive web download limit?: The OneDrive web client lets you select files and folders and click Download — but the resulting zip has hard limits: 20 GB total size and 10,000 items, whichever you hit first. If your school OneDrive is bigger, you'll need either multiple selective downloads or a tool that streams without buffering the whole zip on Microsoft's side.
Can I just sync OneDrive to my home laptop?: Sometimes. If your school's IT policy allows it, install the OneDrive desktop client on a personal laptop and sign in with your school account; it will sync your OneDrive locally. Two caveats: it can take days for a large drive, and the moment your account is deactivated the local cache disappears too (sync removes 'orphaned' files).
Does mydocs.school have the same 20 GB limit?: No. We stream files into the zip as it travels to your browser, so the per-zip cap is only as large as your free disk space. We do have an upper file count of around 30,000 per export, which is more than enough for almost any individual OneDrive.
What about shared files and SharePoint sites?: Files owned by someone else and shared with you are technically not yours to keep. mydocs.school only includes files you have personal ownership of. Same rule applies to OneDrive web download — you can usually download a copy of shared files, but you don't own them and shouldn't assume that copy stays available.