How to switch Gmail accounts

Would you like to change the sender name that appears in messages you send via Gmail? Would you like to change your email address on Gmail without losing your contacts or previous messages? Sorry, such a feature is not yet covered in Gmail … but maybe I know a way to achieve a similar result anyway!

Give me five minutes and I’ll explain how to change your Gmail account by changing your name (function normally provided by the Google e-mail service), the personal information associated with your account (mobile number, birth date, etc.) and creating a new Gmail address in which to import the contents of the old account. I assure you that these are really very simple operations. Simple, but perhaps a little boring.

Creating a new Gmail account and importing old messages and contacts into it can take some time – let’s say it’s not a very fun job to do – but you don’t need to. be experts in technological subjects to succeed. So I would say not to get lost in chat further and take action immediately: there is an email address on Gmail that needs to be changed!

Change the name and personal information of a Gmail account

Let’s start this tutorial on how to switch Gmail accounts by seeing how to change the name and personal information associated with an email address.

If you want to change the name displayed in the “sender” field of your emails, connected to your email inbox on Gmail, click on the gear icon located at the top right and select the Settings item from the menu that appears. On the page that opens, select the Account and import tab, click on the edit information link next to your email address (in the Send message as field ) and type the new name you want to associate with your Gmail account in the white text under Name (in the window that opens). When the operation is completed, click on the button save your changes and that’s it. Any new messages you send from your Gmail account will have your new name in the sender field.

If you want to change the personal information associated with your Gmail account, connect to google.it and click first on your photo at the top right and then on the Personal Account button in the box that appears. On the page that opens, select the item Your personal data from the Personal information and privacy menu and choose which data to modify. You can change your name, nickname, primary or secondary email address (you cannot change your primary Gmail address), phone number and birth date. To choose which of your personal information can be disclosed to the public through your Google Plus profile, click on the Personal Information button.

Change your Gmail address

Would you like to switch Gmail accounts to use another email address without losing your old contacts and previous messages? Unfortunately, as already mentioned above, this possibility is not yet contemplated by Gmail, but there is a “trick” that allows you to achieve a similar result.

If you want, you can create a new email account on Gmail, transfer the messages and contacts of the old address to it and activate the automatic forwarding of emails from the old to the new mailbox. This way all the messages you receive on the old account will be automatically transferred to the new one.

To create a new Gmail account, connected to google.it, click on your photo at the top right and click first on the Add account button (in the menu that appears) and then on the item Create an account (on the page that opens). Then fill out the form that is proposed to you and that’s it.

To transfer your old messages to your new Gmail account, connect to your old Gmail address and enable mail forwarding via POP. If you don’t know how to do it, click on the gear icon located at the top right and select the Settings item from the menu that appears. In the page that opens, select the Forwarding and POP / IMAP tab, put the checkmark next to Enable POP for all messages (even messages already downloaded) and click on the Save changes button to save the changes.

Then access your new Gmail address, click on the gear icon located at the top right and select the Settings item from the menu that appears. On the page that opens, select the Accounts and import tab, click on Add your POP3 mail account and type in the address of your old Gmail account. Then press the Next step button, enter the login credentials of your old Gmail account in the form that is proposed to you and click on the Add account button.

If you want to get the ability to send messages from your old Gmail address using your new email account, put the checkmark next to the appropriate item and click on the Next step button. Then type in the verification code that is sent to you on your old Gmail account and that’s it. The import of messages on the new Gmail address will start immediately but may take several days to complete (it depends on the amount of data to be processed).

To activate the automatic forwarding of new messages on the new Gmail account, go back to your old Gmail account, click on the gear icon located at the top right and select the Settings item from the menu that appears. On the page that opens, select the Forwarding and POP / IMAP tab, press the Add a forwarding address button and type your new Gmail address in the appropriate text field.

Then, click on the Next, Proceed and OK buttons; click on the link contained in the confirmation message that you will receive on your new Gmail address and press the Confirm button to authorize the automatic forwarding of messages.

Finally, access the settings of your old Gmail account again, select the Forwarding and POP / IMAP tab and put the checkmark next to Forward a copy of incoming mail to. Then select your new Gmail address from the drop-down menu for choosing the forwarding address, make sure that the option Keep the Gmail copy in the Inbox is active and click the Save changes button to save the changes.

From now on, all new messages addressed to your old Gmail account will be automatically “turned over” to the new one without you having to lift a finger.

Note: in case you have purchased a subscription to Google One, in order to expand the storage space for your Gmail account, you may find it difficult to transfer all messages to the new email address, which will only have one 15 GB free space.

To solve this problem, either activate a Google One subscription for the new account (prices starting at € 1.99 / month for 100 GB) or add both accounts within a family group, so that space is shared. To know in detail how to perform these operations, refer to the instructions provided in my tutorial dedicated to Google One.

To transfer your address book from the old to the new Gmail address, log in to your old e-mail account, click on the Gmail item located at the top left and select the Contacts item from the menu that appears. On the page that opens, click on the More button and then on Export (in the left sidebar). When asked if you want to switch to the previous version of contacts, accept.

At this point, click on the More button at the top, select the Export item from the menu that opens and put the checkmark next to the All contacts and Google CSV format items. Then press the Export button and the entire address book of your old Gmail account will be exported to your PC in the form of a CSV file.

Now you need to import the CSV file you just got into your new Gmail account. Then connected to the latter, click on the Gmail item located at the top left and select the Contacts item from the menu that opens. On the page that opens, click on the More button and then on Import (in the left sidebar). When asked if you want to switch to the previous version of contacts, accept.

Finally, press the More button at the top and select the Import item from the menu that opens. Click the Choose File button to select the CSV file you previously exported from your old account and click the Import button to start importing the contacts into the new Gmail account.

Mission accomplished! You now have a new Gmail address with your old messages, your old contacts and the ability to send and receive messages from your previous email address at any time.

Switch Gmail accounts in Chrome and Android

Do you want to switch Gmail accounts in Chrome or on your Android smartphone? No problem. You will find explained how to do it in my tutorials on how to reset Chrome and how to reset Android, two guides in which I dealt with the browser and the Google operating system, explaining in detail how to reset them using new or old Gmail accounts. You will be amazed at how simple it is!