Good news for people who regret the Gmail address they came up with when they registered for an account: Google is now letting users change it.
Google started quietly rolling out the change late last year in India and said this week in a blog post that it’s now available for all Google Account users in the United States. There were no details on when it would be available to users in other countries.
Google's CEO suggested the update will be welcomed
by people who want to keep their accounts but have outgrown the awkward, embarrassing or nonsensical Gmail handles they created after the service launched 22 years ago.
“2004 was a good year, but your Gmail address doesn’t need to be stuck in it,” Sundar Pichai wrote in a post on X, adding that the policy change means users could “say goodbye to v0t3f0rp3dr02004@gmail.com or mrbrightside416@gmail.com (or whatever you were into at the time).”
The company also updated a help page to reflect the new policy. Here's a quick run-through:
The procedure to change a Gmail address is fairly easy to follow. First, go to your Google account page. From the Google homepage in your computer browser or the Google mobile app, click the account icon in the top right corner, and then click Manage your Google Account, then Personal info, then Email.
Now you should be able to click Change Google Account email. If you don't see it, you might not have the option yet.
This is when you can enter a new address, then click to confirm that you want to make the change. Make sure you have an idea of what you want for your new address. Google says addresses can't be identical to any existing address or one that was “used by someone in the past and then deleted.”
But what if you still like your old Gmail address? Don't worry, you'll still be able to access it because Google is effectively creating a second Gmail address.
The old address will remain as an alternate email address and messages sent to either your old or new Google Account addresses will appear in your Gmail inbox. To find out which address an email was sent to, check the “to” field.
You can switch back to the old address by changing the settings in your Google account.
If you don't like the new Gmail address you've created, unfortunately you're out of luck - at least for the next year. Google won't let you create another Gmail address for your account until 12 months have passed. And you can only do so three times in total.
Gmail addresses are also used to sign in to other Google services like YouTube, Google Docs as well as third-party websites and apps. But the company warns that some non-Google apps and services might not recognize you if you're using a new email to sign in, so it provided some troubleshooting tips on a help page.
Google also says Chromebook users might encounter problems, though many issues will go away after a few hours. It advises users to check a troubleshooting page but warned that if the problems persist, “you may need to change back to your previous Google Account email,” although the new address can still be used to send and receive messages.
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