Considering what's going on, I wish to move to a European mailing service and replace my Gmail account. I know it's not much since I'm just one person, but it's my way to support Europe. Already replaced my search engine with Ecosia and Google Maps with HERE WeGo.

Thing is I've been using gmail for over a decade so everything goes there. Obviously I will communicate to people around me that my email changed and for a time, I'll set up an automated forward to my new address before deleting my gmail account.

However I'm curious to hear any tips on how you handled this.

Also, as a side question, which European mail service did you choose and would you recommend it?


31 comments

  1. I’ve self-hosted my own e-mail server for years. Slowly migrated most stuff to it over time.

  5. Use Proton or Posteo. Register redirect in the Gmail to your new address, and slowly update the address to your new one in every major service you use. Will take a few weeks of low effort and you should be done.
    There will be for sure accounts somewhere you forgot about, but you will catch up on it in the following months or years. You don’t have to delete the Gmail account immediately. The most important thing now is to stop using it for essential services and thus feeding it with your personal data.

    Also, don’t forget you can request to download all your data from all Google services, and then delete your Google account completely if that’s ok with you.

  8. To replace gmail : [mailo](https://www.mailo.com/), [tutanota](https://tutanota.com/fr/), [protonmail](https://proton.me/). I find mailo easier to use for a family or a nonprofit organization without “techy” members.

    If you are searching alternative softwares to google and cie, I recommand you to check the portal of [Framasoft](https://degooglisons-internet.org/en/), especially their “De-google-ify Internet” campaign. It a French nonprofit organization aiming to promote free and open-source softwares, notably for education field. They recommend many useful alternative softwares (online or not).

  9. I have been using Runbox (Norway) for several years with my own domain names. I still use gmail but for non important things.

    Setting your own domain names is not that difficult and once it’s done you don’t have to do anything beside renewing the domain.

    [https://runbox.com](https://runbox.com)

  11. Gone to Proton. It isn’t as integrated as MS or Google, calendar and drive, but it is secure. I started migrating with key account data, eg banks, financial stuff as the main contact. It will take time, but worth it in the long run.

  12. “Considering what’s going on”? We don’t see this the same way, in many aspects.
    No, I won’t. I won’t trade quality for ideological reasons.

  13. I just exportet all my saved mails to Proton and started changing my emailaddress on sites as I got to them. In the meantime, my gmail sits there and catches everything as usual, untill i figure out of it’s something that should go directly to my new inbox or via an alias.

    Sorting the importet emails took a while, but not it’s all neat and tidy. I even got around to deleting accounts/data from various websites and services I don’t use anymore!

  15. While I can understand switching away from Gmail purely on the grounds that they’re just not very good at email and never mind anything else, why would you want to restrict your choices to only European providers? There’s a great big world out there.

    FWIW I recently switched from self-hosting my email here in the UK to Fastmail, who are Australian.

  16. I have been using GMX for a while in parallel with Gmail. I intend to slowly move things over. I just keep Gmail so not to miss any accounts I may not remember having signed up to with that email.

  17. I’m with Proton, and have slowly been moving stuff over.

    My only quibble as a non-techy person is that their online content, descriptions of services etc remind me of emails sent by our data bods at work: I understand what all the individual words mean, just not in that particular order. When I’ve asked them for clarification they just muddy the waters further. So for the moment I just use mail and (occasionally) the VPN.

  18. Proton and Tuta are good. I have changed to tuta as primary because proton even with paid tier has gone to shit lately with downtimes etc. also check your local provides too maybe it’s cheaper to host there. Like i have all bank and personal stuff at a domain and email by an Italian provider which also offers 100 free PEC mails so if i have balance by end of the year I wish them merry Christmas via legally approved electronic registered mail channel for no apparent reason.

  19. I recently swapped to mailo and am still in the migrating process. I have had my gmail since you needed an invite to create one, and I will probably keep that one but only as a spam mail. Whenever I need to give my email to some site I don’t want mail from, they get the gmail, and the mailo is for the emails I actually want. During this I’ve realised how little of my emails are of interest, and also how little I actually send private emails.

  20. Well, honestly, there simply isn’t any European alternative at present that even comes close to being as good as Gmail.

  21. I never used Gmail in the first place, except for the university mail.
    I had an email address before Gmail was popular and never had the need to change it.

  22. [mailbox.org](mailbox.org) it is for me!
    Have been with them for years, with custom domain and with a @mailbox.org adress.
    Can only recommend.

  23. For everyone using Proton, maybe you should read up a bit instead of just going with the wave.

    [Proton Mail Says It’s “Politically Neutral” While Praising Republican Party](https://theintercept.com/2025/01/28/proton-mail-andy-yen-trump-republicans/)

    [Proton Mail – Swiss based private email service focused on data privacy – CEO comes out in support of Donald Trump and his cabinet pick Gail Slater. “Dems stood for the little guys, but today the tables have completely turned” : r/SubredditDrama](https://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/1i2q6a9/proton_mail_swiss_based_private_email_service/)

    Yes, the latest post was removed with the old classic “taken out of context”. Give me a break.

  24. The issue for me is that Android still needs a google account, so switching my email has very little impact since my phone collects all my data no matter what I do. I would happily switch from Google to a high privacy european mail provider and get rid of Android, but sadly I need my bank app, public transport app etc. daily.

  26. It should be easy to anyone to setup their own mailserver on a VPS and a custom domain name and get your own server for you and your family. You could have 100GB that you share or such.

  27. Switched to Tutamail. I still have my Gmail because it is easier for me to make the switch slowly. It’s going well so far, I really like Tuta.

  29. Just curious. Are you all switching away from the iPhone aswell, or are you just making a switch where its convenient to do so?

  31. Protonmail, its not really a bit deal to change over.

    Also there’s a chance the address you want is available.

    When you get your free protonmail, you get a guide on how to set up email forwarding from your gmail, so even if you forget to change your email address on various sites you still get your messages.

    It’s really very easy.

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