Mailbox Taxi vs Shoviv: Email Migration Tool Comparison

Shoviv is a long-standing name in the Windows email-utility space — a catalogue of tools where each one converts, migrates, or recovers a specific data format or provider pair. Mailbox Taxi takes the opposite approach: a single cross-platform desktop tool that handles live IMAP-to-IMAP migration across the major providers. Both are valid models. This post compares them on the dimensions that matter — supported sources, licensing, MSP fit, and operational details — so you can pick based on the shape of the work, not on marketing copy.

Product philosophy#

The two products have fundamentally different design intents and you'll see this reflected in everything from the installer to the licensing.

Shoviv#

Shoviv is a Windows IT-utility vendor in the tradition of SysTools, Stellar, and Kernel — a deep catalogue of focused tools. Need to convert PST to MBOX? There's a tool. Need to recover a corrupt OST? Different tool. Need to migrate Exchange to Office 365? Yet another tool. Each is single-purpose, each is licensed individually, and each has its own UI conventions. The strength is depth in specific formats; the cost is that a multi-step workflow may require buying and learning multiple tools.

Mailbox Taxi#

Mailbox Taxi is a single desktop application focused on live IMAP-to-IMAP migration across the major providers (Gmail, Outlook/Microsoft 365, Yahoo, iCloud, Zoho, AOL, ProtonMail Bridge, Fastmail, GMX, Yandex, custom IMAP). Cross-platform — Windows, macOS, Linux. The intent is one tool, one workflow, one log format, covering the migration scenarios MSPs and IT teams actually face most often.

For the wider context of where each fits, see the best email migration tools 2026 roundup.

Supported sources and destinations#

Shoviv's coverage#

Strong on file formats. PST, OST, EDB, MBOX, EML, MSG — each has a Shoviv tool. Also strong on Exchange-to-cloud scenarios with dedicated migrators for Exchange to Office 365, Lotus Notes to Office 365, GroupWise to Office 365. The IMAP-to-IMAP space is covered but not the centre of gravity — you'll find provider-pair tools but the live IMAP scenario isn't where Shoviv markets hardest.

Mailbox Taxi's coverage#

Centred on live IMAP and provider-API. The supported providers list reads: Gmail, Microsoft 365, Outlook.com, Yahoo, iCloud, Zoho, AOL, ProtonMail Bridge, Fastmail, GMX, Yandex, custom IMAP servers. Where Shoviv has a tool per file format, Mailbox Taxi handles the live-mailbox scenarios — moving Gmail to M365, Yahoo to Outlook, hosting-to-hosting transitions. File-import work (importing a PST archive) is on the roadmap but not the primary focus today.

For the file-conversion side, Mailbox Taxi vs Stellar Converter covers another tool in that category, and the best PST conversion tools post lists the dedicated converters.

Comparison at a glance#

Licensing model#

This is where the two diverge most.

Shoviv#

Per-tool, per-seat. If your workflow involves PST conversion plus Exchange migration plus OST recovery, that's three separate licences. The individual tools tend to be moderately priced (typically $99–$299 per tool, per seat, for the standard tier), but they stack up if you need several. Enterprise and technician licences exist with broader rights. For an IT consultant who does a specific job — recovering a corrupt OST for a one-off client — buying just that one tool is efficient. For an MSP doing varied migration work, the licence count grows.

Mailbox Taxi#

A single tool covering the live-IMAP scenarios. Pricing has not been publicly announced — the product is in waitlist phase. The intent is a model that doesn't make MSPs assemble a per-engagement licence bundle. If your work is mostly live mailbox moves, one tool, one licence, one workflow.

MSP and team workflows#

Running Shoviv at an MSP#

Each technician's workstation may need multiple tools installed depending on the engagement. Standardising on a tool inventory ("for this kind of project, use these three Shoviv tools") works but requires documentation and discipline. Log formats vary across tools, so a unified audit trail across an engagement requires manual aggregation. The strength: when a specific tricky job appears (a corrupted PST, an EDB dump from a dead Exchange server), Shoviv's deep tooling is often the answer.

Running Mailbox Taxi at an MSP#

One tool, one install, one set of logs per engagement. Cross-platform means your techs can work from Mac or Linux laptops without a Windows VM. The workflow is consistent across providers — the Gmail-to-M365 run looks like the Yahoo-to-Outlook run looks like the Zoho-to-Fastmail run. The trade-off: when a job is fundamentally a file-conversion task (importing a 50GB PST archive into a new tenant), you'll reach for a dedicated converter rather than Mailbox Taxi.

The honest assessment for MSPs: most shops end up with both kinds of tool in the kit. Mailbox Taxi for the bread-and-butter live migrations, a converter (Shoviv, Stellar, SysTools, or a free alternative) for the occasional file-format job. See Mailbox Taxi vs SysTools for the SysTools comparison.

Performance and reliability#

Both are desktop tools running on the engineer's workstation, so throughput is governed by local bandwidth and provider-side throttling rather than vendor infrastructure.

Throttle handling#

Mailbox Taxi exposes connection-count and batch-size controls so you can tune for known provider behaviour — Yahoo's hard cap on concurrent IMAP, Microsoft Graph's per-app limit, Gmail's per-project quotas. Shoviv's tools handle throttling internally with less user-visible tuning. For an experienced engineer, exposed knobs are a feature; for a less experienced operator, hidden auto-tuning may be friendlier.

Pause and resume#

Both support pause and resume within a session. Mailbox Taxi persists state across application restarts more aggressively, so a crashed workstation resumes mid-batch on relaunch. Some Shoviv tools restart from the beginning of a folder if interrupted mid-folder — verify behaviour with the specific tool before relying on it for long-running jobs.

Error visibility#

Both write local logs. Shoviv's format varies tool-to-tool. Mailbox Taxi writes a single CSV/JSON log per run with per-message status, which is easier to consume in post-migration reporting. Real errors you'll see in either include AUTHENTICATIONFAILED, Too many simultaneous connections, Folder UTF-7 conversion error, and Message too large for destination.

File-format scenarios where Shoviv wins#

Let's be specific about where Shoviv is the right answer.

• Corrupt PST recovery: A dedicated converter beats a live-migration tool every time
• OST extraction from an orphaned Outlook profile: Shoviv has tools for exactly this
• EDB-level recovery from a dead Exchange server: Live IMAP can't help here
• MBOX-to-PST conversion for an Outlook desktop user: A purpose-built converter
• GroupWise or Lotus Notes legacy archives: Niche but Shoviv covers it

For these, buying the specific Shoviv tool — or another vendor's equivalent — is the right move. The PST MBOX EML migration guide covers the file-format scenarios in depth.

Live migration scenarios where Mailbox Taxi wins#

• Gmail to Microsoft 365 for a 40-person company
• Hosting provider change (cPanel-IMAP to Fastmail) for a small business
• Yahoo legacy account to Outlook.com personal
• MSP doing varied small-business migrations across the year
• Compliance-driven migration where the workstation must control the data path

For these, a single unified IMAP migration tool with modern OAuth, exposed throttle controls, and cross-platform support fits better than assembling a stack of single-purpose utilities.

How to decide#

Look at the actual work you do this year.

• More than 60% of your jobs are live IMAP-to-IMAP across major providers? Mailbox Taxi territory.
• More than 60% are file-format conversions, OST recovery, or EDB extraction? Shoviv (or similar vendor) territory.
• A roughly even split? Run both. They don't conflict, and the licence cost of keeping a dedicated converter in the toolbox is small relative to engineering time.

For a broader picture of the comparison set, see Mailbox Taxi vs SysTools and Mailbox Taxi vs Stellar Converter, which compare similar Windows-utility vendors.