Transfer OneDrive personal account that is over the 5GB limit to a OneDrive Family Plan

Add your existing Microsoft account to your wife’s Microsoft 365 Family subscription; this restores subscription storage to that same account, so the 22 GB of OneDrive files do not need to be downloaded or transferred.

Join the Family subscription

Your wife must be the subscription owner, not merely someone with whom another owner shared the plan.

1. Your wife signs in to the Microsoft 365 sharing page using the account that owns the Family subscription:
   https://account.microsoft.com/services/office/sharing
2. Select Share.
3. Select Email invite, enter the email address of your existing over-quota Microsoft account, and select Invite. Alternatively, select Create link and send the resulting link to you.
4. Open the invitation while signed in to the same Microsoft account containing the 22 GB of files.
5. Select Get started, then Join now.
6. Accept the invitation within 48 hours. If your account belongs to another Microsoft family group, leave that group before accepting. [^1^](https://support.microsoft.com/accounts-billing/subscriptions/[Subscription ID] "Share your Microsoft 365 subscription | Microsoft Support")

After acceptance, your account receives the Family subscription’s OneDrive storage benefit. Your Microsoft account, email address, and existing OneDrive remain the same; the files do not move into your wife’s OneDrive and remain private. [^2^](https://support.microsoft.com/accounts-billing/subscriptions/[Subscription ID] "Someone invited you to share their Microsoft 365 subscription")

Microsoft personal accounts cannot be merged or combined. Family sharing grants subscription benefits while keeping each person’s OneDrive files and photos separate. ^3^

After accepting

Allow the storage entitlement to update, then:

1. Start OneDrive from the Windows Start menu.
2. Sign in with your existing account if requested.
3. Check the OneDrive cloud icon in the taskbar.
4. Open File Explorer and select your OneDrive folder.

Because an over-quota account cannot upload, edit, or sync new files, syncing may have stopped when the expired subscription reduced the allowance to 5 GB. Existing files remain read-only and can still be downloaded. Restoring sufficient storage removes that quota problem; there is no separate 5 GB download limit requiring you to move the files first. ^4^

If the invitation cannot be sent or accepted

• No Share button: Your wife may not own the subscription, or the plan may be Microsoft 365 Basic/Personal rather than Family. Only the owner of an eligible shared subscription can invite members. [^1^](https://support.microsoft.com/accounts-billing/subscriptions/[Subscription ID] "Share your Microsoft 365 subscription | Microsoft Support")
• Already in a family group: Leave the other group, then have your wife resend the invitation.
• Sync still does not resume after the quota updates: Start OneDrive from the Start menu. If it is already running but remains disconnected, unlinking and relinking the account is the documented next sync-repair step. ^5^
• Your wife is not the subscription owner: The actual owner must share the subscription with your existing account. Copying all 22 GB into your wife’s personal OneDrive would create a second copy under her account and is unnecessary.

Do not delete the original files or close the original Microsoft account while resolving this. An account that remains over quota can eventually be frozen, and Microsoft states that files might be deleted after six months over the limit. ^4^

References

1. [Share your Microsoft 365 subscription | Microsoft Support](https://support.microsoft.com/accounts-billing/subscriptions/[Subscription ID])
2. [Someone invited you to share their Microsoft 365 subscription](https://support.microsoft.com/accounts-billing/subscriptions/[Subscription ID])
3. Combining Microsoft accounts | Microsoft Support
4. My OneDrive says it's full
5. [Personal accounts](https://support.microsoft.com/onedrive/fix-onedrive-sync-problems)