Email aliases & forwarding explained

Have you ever wanted emails sent to info@yourbusiness.com and hello@yourbusiness.com to both arrive in the same inbox? That's what email aliases are for. This guide explains what aliases are, when to use them, and how forwarding fits in.

What is an email alias?

An alias is an additional address that maps to your existing inbox. You don't get a separate mailbox. All email arrives in one place.

Example:

Your main address: jane@yourbusiness.com
Aliases: hello@yourbusiness.com, contact@yourbusiness.com, info@yourbusiness.com
All three deliver to Jane's inbox

Jane can also choose to send replies from any of those addresses, so the reply comes from info@ rather than her personal jane@ address.

When aliases are useful

Situation	How aliases help
You want a professional generic address (`hello@`, `info@`) without creating a separate user	Create it as an alias on your main account
You're rebranding and have a new domain name	Add the old address as an alias so emails to either address arrive in one inbox
You want a role-based address (`sales@`, `billing@`) that goes to one person	Create it as an alias, no extra cost
You're testing a new format before rolling it out	Use an alias to try it without committing

Aliases vs separate accounts

	Alias	Separate account
Needs its own license/cost	No	Yes
Has its own storage	No (shares the main inbox)	Yes
Can have its own password	No	Yes
Multiple people can access it	No	Use a shared mailbox instead

If multiple people need to access the same inbox (like a support@ address that the whole team monitors), you want a shared mailbox instead of an alias.

Same question, opposite answers: an alias adds addresses to one inbox, a group adds inboxes to one address. So count the people who need to see the mail: a shared address for several of them is what a group is for.

Read this as text

An alias works like this. Two different addresses on your domain (hello@, which is the alias, and sarah@, which is her primary address) both deliver to the same place: Sarah’s regular inbox. Adding an alias adds a way to reach one person. It never adds a person.

A group runs the other way. One address, support@, delivers a copy to every member: Sarah’s inbox and Marco’s inbox. Adding a member adds someone who sees the mail, without creating a new address.

So the two are not settings of the same thing: they point in opposite directions. Count the people who need to read the message. Several people sharing one address is what a group is for; several addresses for one person is what an alias is for.

What is email forwarding?

Forwarding sends a copy of incoming email to a different email address, which might be at a completely different domain.

Example: Email sent to old@previousdomain.com is forwarded to jane@yourbusiness.com.

Forwarding is useful when:

You're migrating from an old domain and want to catch emails sent to the old address
You want messages sent to one address to go to multiple people (though a distribution list is often better for this, see Group & distribution lists explained)
You're consolidating multiple accounts into one place temporarily

Forwarding and spam filters

Forwarding can cause messages to be filtered as spam. The reason is that the forwarding server isn't one of the servers the original sender's domain authorizes to send its mail, so the receiving server's SPF check on the forwarded copy fails. This is a known side effect of how SPF works, not a fault in your setup. Ask Chykalophia about better alternatives if forwarding causes deliverability issues.

How to add an alias

The steps vary by platform.

Open the Admin console at admin.google.com.

Open the Menu and go to Directory → Users, then click the name of the user you want to add an alias for.

On the left, under the user's name, click Add Alternate Emails.

Click Alternate email, type the part of the address before the @, pick a domain if you have more than one, and save. Changes can take up to 24 hours, though they usually happen much faster.

To send from the alias: in Gmail, go to Settings → See all settings → Accounts (labelled Accounts and import on some accounts), then in the Send mail as section click Add another email address. Gmail sends a confirmation message you have to open and click before the address can be used.

How many aliases can I have?

Google Workspace: up to 30 aliases per user, at no extra cost.
Microsoft 365: several hundred per user. Microsoft's alias guide says up to 400, while its Exchange Online limits page lists around 300 for Microsoft 365 Business and Enterprise plans, and notes the real cap depends on how long the addresses are.

In practice, most businesses use just a handful.

Common questions

Does an alias have its own storage?

No. All email delivered to an alias lands in the main inbox and uses that inbox's storage quota. If storage is a concern, see Email storage & archiving.

Can an alias exist on a different domain?

Yes, if that domain is set up in your email platform. For example, if your business owns both yourbusiness.com and yourbusiness.co.uk, you can have aliases on both domains.

Can I make one alias receive email but not send from it?

You can set it up so you only receive (no send capability). Just don't add the alias as a send-from address in your email client settings.

What's the difference between an alias and a catch-all?

A catch-all is a special setting that sends email addressed to your domain but not to any real account (a typo, or an address that no longer exists) to a designated inbox. It's a broader version of an alias. See Email routing & catch-all for more.