How to Customize Your Gmail Address on the Fly

The Gmail Logo.

Did you know you can customize your Gmail address and make it easier to read? It can also help you track who sends you messages. We’ll walk you through the process.

Add Periods to Your Email Address

You can place a period (.) between any of the characters in your email address username. Gmail doesn’t acknowledge it as a character in the username; it completely ignores it.

It can be helpful to use this character in long, multiple-word email addresses. It separates the string of characters and makes the address easier to read.

For example, if your email is firstnamelastname@gmail.com, you can type it as firstname.lastname@gmail.com, and Gmail still sees it as the original address. If you want, you can also type, f.i.r.s.t.n.a.m.e.l.a.s.t.n.a.m.e@gmail.com, but that’s a bit excessive.

Do keep in mind, though, you can’t type a period at the beginning or end of your username, or use them consecutively.

Append with a Plus Sign

You can also use a plus sign (+) sign to append any number of words or numbers to the end of your username. Just like the period, Gmail ignores the plus sign and anything that follows it so you can customize and create an endless supply of email addresses.

This trick is especially great for newsletters and websites that require an email address to sign up because you can add the site name to help organize your inbox.

For example, if you wanted to sign up for the How-To Geek newsletter, firstname@gmail.com turns into firstname+howtogeek@gmail.com. The newsletter still comes to your inbox as it normally would, but it appears to have been sent to “firstname+howtogeek@gmail.com.”

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