Migrating away from Gmail?

TimmyO

Also - do you want to continue to use your own domain name?

goldtop

TimmyO said:

What makes you think you’re using pop3? 

How do you access the email currently - only on the gmail website or via mobile devices and/or mail apps on a computer too?  

I understand that I am now using IMAP with Gmail, but that was a change and previously I was fine with POP3 (I didn't explain very well).

I only access email via MacOS + Chrome browser.

(No need nor interest in using my phone to get pestered by work emails! When I go on holiday, I go on holiday.)

TimmyO

ok. These days most email services use IMAP by default, and I don't think there's a downside to just going along with that (the above difference of opinion notwithstanding :-)  ) 

If you're needing tom keep your custom domain, I'd normally say you're going to end up having pay someone for something but I did just do a Google and there do seem to be some email services that let you use them for free and also add a domain (e.g. Zoho email - looks like for 5 users or less it's free - can add a domain - can migrate from GSuite - gotchas are if you use google email 'tags' you need to think about that - the Zoho migration instructions have info. 

If you're a Mac user then if you pay for iCloud+ then you can add up to 5 email domains - I was already paying or iCloud+ (for the storage) so I added a domain to my email and use that for one but of my business use - but it's not free (unless you already have iCloud+) 

goldtop

I do have iCloud+ so I will look into that option, too.

I think I need to make a flowchart this weekend...

goldtop

No idea if this might be useful to others, but I'll update as I go. 

First step is a backup - downloading a full dataset from Gmail. I'm using the Takeout option, described here: https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3024190?sjid=16551087686762010574-EU

Creates ZIP files, broken into chunks of up to 10GB. "May take hours or days" it says. There's 12GB or so in total... waiting for the download link(s) to arrive by email...

goldtop

idiotwindow said:

POP is hopeless as soon as you start to use more than one device regularly and want to reference old emails (especially sent emails). IMAP doesn't preclude having "physical custody" of your email archive. You can easily create an offline archive of all your IMAP mail if you are paranoid about Google or Apple going out of business.

FWIW, I don't expect either to go out of business. But I do expect China, Russia and North Korea to get better and better at hacking, and I think we all know the big tech cos are their highest value targets.

goldtop

And it was just 20 minutes until Google emailed to say my download is ready...

Only 3.1GB, zipped (from 12GB). Seems a bit small?

goldtop

That massive difference in data size was due to Google's storage still containing >6GB of old files. So there was just 4.5GB of actual email data. The extra files (several thousands) were in the 'Storage' area of Google's panel, whereas the Drive itself was empty, which it should be, because I moved everything to Dropbox years ago. Don't quite understand why those files are still there.

I changed the MX records back to Siteground's own servers last night. As expected, at first test messages sent to the email address bounced back as undeliverable (permanent error). By this morning new test messages are queueing at Siteground (when checking the account via their Webmail interface).

Next: decide on iCloud+ and/or Mac Mail or Protonmail. (I did previously use eM Client, and may have another look at that.)

TimmyO

If you go the iCloud route, it will also let you use the added-on domain account as the sender of calendar invitations when seeing invites from your iCloud calendar (which might useful) - just be aware that this is then the case for all invites from that calendar - you can’t flip between them 

Fingers657

This free Switzerland based service is brilliant and they don’t want your phone number.
I hate Google all they want is your info to track everything you do.

https://proton.me/mail

Kittyfrisk

Fingers657 said:

This free Switzerland based service is brilliant and they don’t want your phone number.
I hate Google all they want is your info to track everything you do.

https://proton.me/mail

Second sentence of the OP's initial post "(and I am looking into Protonmail)."