What is the Gmail + trick and how to use Gmail plus addressing (2024)

Have you ever had a need for multiple email addresses but want to avoid the hassle of managing them all separately? Or maybe you’re overwhelmed by a constant influx of emails, from work priorities and online banking updates to unfamiliar newsletters you don’t remember signing up for.

A busy inbox is a stressful inbox, especially when you can never seem to find the surface. So, how can you better organize and filter your messages? How can you monitor who has access to your private information and where unwanted spam originates from?

This guide will walk you through the Gmail + trick, a versatile tool that can significantly enhance your email experience.

What is the Gmail + trick?

The Gmail + trick uses what’s called “plus addressing” to quickly create unique email addresses that can receive mail in an existing email account.

All you have to do is add a "+" symbol and any word or combination of characters after your username and before the "@" symbol. Gmail will deliver messages sent to each variation in your main inbox. It's like having a bunch of virtual doors leading to the same room.

For instance, if your email is janedoe@gmail.com, you can create numerous aliases serving different functions, such as:

  • For personal matters: janedoe+friends@gmail.com and/or janedoe+family@gmail.com
  • For professional communications: janedoe+work@gmail.com
  • For finances: janedoe+banking@gmail.com
  • For online purchases: janedoe+shopping@gmail.com
  • For recurring paid services: janedoe+subscriptions@gmail.com

What is the Gmail + trick and how to use Gmail plus addressing (1)

There are infinite opportunities.

Alternatively, you can create aliases for specific service providers you expect to receive regular emails from (ex., janedoe+salliemae@gmail.com) and even utilize the feature for customer management for your business, which we’ll delve into later. Keep in mind that only your username can be changed. The @gmail.com must remain as is.

The benefits of Gmail plus addressing

Here’s a breakdown of the many ways the Gmail address + trick can streamline your email management.

Organize your inbox

Struggling to locate crucial messages buried in a cluttered inbox?

Adding a + to Gmail can seriously organize your digital life ­– and reduce the overwhelm. With this addressing technique, you can effortlessly filter, sort, and categorize incoming messages.

After you’ve created your aliases, set up filters in Gmail to automatically label and categorize emails sent to each of the addresses.

Let Gmail do the grunt work, and voilà – you’ll have a tidy inbox. Your personal, work, shopping, financial, and subscription emails will be neatly organized in their designated folders, leaving your primary inbox far more digestible.

When you’re ready to find a certain email, simply search for the alias in the ‘To’ field.

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See who’s sharing your data

Gmail plus addressing goes beyond inbox organization – one key utility lies in pinpointing spam sources using specific identifiers.

According to MailModo, the most common type of spam is marketing/advertising, accounting for nearly 36% of all spam emails. And, of all the countries that send the most spam emails, the United States is at the top of the list, sending a whopping 8.61 billion spam emails as of October 2021. This likely comes as no surprise, considering how paralyzing some of our inboxes can get.

Ever wonder how businesses you’ve never even engaged with got your email address? The truth is that many websites sell and leak our data, sometimes because we’ve gotten accustomed to accepting privacy policies without much consideration. However, there are actions we can take.

If you’re concerned about data privacy, the Gmail alias trick aids in tracking who is sharing your information with third parties without your explicit consent. If you sign up for a rewards program through Home Depot with janedoe+hdrewards@gmail.com and suddenly start getting spam sent to that email address, you’ll know where it originated.

If a specific alias starts getting sketchy emails, create a filter, mark it as junk, unsubscribe, and your problem will be solved. You could also remove your email from the original program or email list.

Using the Gmail + trick, you can start to chip away at the source of your unwanted email problems.

Create unlimited addresses for testing purposes

Are you a developer or email marketer tired of creating new email accounts for every test scenario? The Gmail + trick provides a valuable solution for facilitating testing environments.

For example, if you are building an e-commerce website and want to experiment with a new registration feature, you can use Gmail plus addressing to quickly create an alias rather than an entirely new account. If you are creating an email campaign that thousands of subscribers will receive and want to preview several versions before distribution, use an alias.

This tool is a game-changer for testing different features without the inconvenience of managing multiple email accounts. Not only will this streamline your testing processes and workflow, but it will also keep all test-related correspondence neatly grouped.

Track and personalize customer interactions

If you’re a business owner, you may want to track different customer interactions. You could use janedoe+client1@gmail.com, janedoe+client2@gmail.com, and so on. It's pretty simple yet remarkably effective.

This is also beneficial for personalizing your communications. When you receive emails, you’ll instantly know which client they're from so you can pick up where you left off. It's a fantastic way to tailor your client engagement.

Track emails with contacts and leads using a CRM in Gmail

The Gmail + trick is a great way to track a small number of customers or clients using folders and the search tool in your Gmail inbox.

Tools like Streak help you automatically track interactions with contacts and leads in pipelines inside your Gmail inbox.

For each lead, you can:

  • Add contact and organizations
  • Automatically pull in all of their emails with your team
  • Record important dates and details
  • Leave comments and notes for yourself and team members
  • Create tasks for follow up and to-do items
  • Add them to mail merge sequences with automatic follow up
  • And more!

Try Streak for free - it takes just minutes to get started with contact tracking and pipelines for any workflow!

Bonus: Gmail dot trick

Another subtle yet effective method for email customization is the Gmail dot trick. This involves placing dots within your email address without affecting the delivery of emails to your primary inbox.

For instance, janedoe@gmail.com can also be written jane.doe@gmail.com. Gmail will treat these variations as identical addresses, but you can use them to categorize and filter emails.

Wondering how this helps? Well, it's perfect for organizing your inbox. You may decide to sign up for newsletters with jane.doe@gmail.com and use janedoe@gmail.com for work. It's an easy way to sort your messages and spot the purpose of each email at a glance.

Keep in mind that Gmail features and functionalities may change over time, so it's a good idea to check the latest documentation or settings within your Gmail account for the most up-to-date information.

What is the Gmail + trick and how to use Gmail plus addressing (2024)

FAQs

What is the Gmail + trick and how to use Gmail plus addressing? ›

All you have to do is add a "+" symbol and any word or combination of characters after your username and before the "@" symbol. Gmail will deliver messages sent to each variation in your main inbox. It's like having a bunch of virtual doors leading to the same room.

What is the +1 Gmail trick? ›

Trick 1.

The “Gmail + trick” can also be wrote as “Gmail plus trick”. This is a useful way to help you create unlimited accounts via a Gmail address. All you need to do is add a plus (+) and any combination of words or numbers after the letters before the @ symbol.

How to use plus addressing in Gmail? ›

Here's how it works: In Gmail, you can add a “+” symbol and any word you want to the end of your email address, and it will still reach your inbox. For example, if your email address is john@gmail.com, you can use john+shopping@gmail.com, john+work@gmail.com, or john+anythingyouwant@gmail.com.

What is the +1 method in Gmail? ›

For example 'myemail@gmail.com' is the email for your current account. You don't want to make a new email, so you enter 'myemail+1@gmail.com' as your email when creating your new account, and you can use the same email. In other words: If you have a gmail account you can add a + to the end of the address.

How does Gmail dot trick work? ›

If someone accidentally adds dots to your address when emailing you, you'll still get that email. For example, if your email is johnsmith@gmail.com, you own all dotted versions of your address: john.smith@gmail.com.

What is the secret key in Gmail? ›

Security keys can be used with 2-Step Verification to help you keep hackers out of your Google Account. Important: If you're a journalist, activist, or someone else at risk of targeted online attacks, learn about the Advanced Protection Program.

Is plus addressing safe? ›

In conclusion, plus addressing is a simple yet powerful tool that can help enhance your email security and privacy. By using unique plus addresses for different purposes and managing them effectively, you can mitigate security risks associated with email communications and stay one step ahead of cyber threats.

Why use plus addressing? ›

Plus addressing allows users to use unique, receive-only email addresses that are extensions of their actual email address. It is useful for creating disposable addresses. The tag acts as a label and is useful for managing email and site registrations.

What can I use instead of email plus addressing? ›

Subdomain addressing offers all the advantages of plus addressing with fewer disadvantages. It works the same as plus addressing, but instead of username+whateveryoulike@domain.tld , you can use an address of the form whateveryoulike@username.domain.tld .

What is ++ in email? ›

The new recipient(s) are added to the To: or CC: fields and their names are also added to the body of the email with a ++ or + , just to inform everyone on the current distribution that others have been added to the discussion. " ++" came from C programming and non-programmers decided to reduce that to a simple "+"

How do I use Gmail effectively? ›

Optimize your Gmail inbox
  1. Keep your inbox clean using Gmail filters, labels, and other options.
  2. Divide your inbox into sections by priority or labels.
  3. Easily manage multiple email addresses or identities.

How do I add +1 to emails? ›

Using Plus Email Addressing

To use this feature, append a + sign and desired descriptor after your account name and before the @ symbol (e.g., john.smith+education@uconn.edu).

What are the 5 categories of Gmail? ›

These categories are Primary, Social, Updates, Forums, and Promotions. These allow Gmail to filter different emails into different tabs, which then allows you to focus your attention on each tab as needed. Gmail automatically sorts emails into categories for you, whether you choose to use the tabbed view or not.

What is the Gmail address trick? ›

All you have to do is add a "+" symbol and any word or combination of characters after your username and before the "@" symbol. Gmail will deliver messages sent to each variation in your main inbox. It's like having a bunch of virtual doors leading to the same room.

Does the dot in a Gmail address matter? ›

Adding dots doesn't change your address, so dots aren't why you got someone else's mail. Instead, the sender probably mistyped or forgot the correct address.

What are the three dots at the bottom of Gmail? ›

Answer: This has to do with how Gmail processes email messages. Sometimes if a message is long, their system will hide content so the message focuses on the most recent or what their system deems most important. If you see the three dots (... or ellipsis) in a message, click on them to expand the content to view it.

What is the +1 email address? ›

If you encounter issues with the uniqueness of your email address - such as if it is already associated with another login - you can utilize an email "alias" by adding "+1" or "+icanotes" to the address. For example: If the email address you@gmail.com is not unique, use an alias such as you+1@gmail.com.

What is this Google 1? ›

Google One is a subscription that gives you more storage across Google Drive, Gmail, and Google Photos. Can I use Google One if I'm not a member? You can back up data on your Android or iOS phone, and also clean up space in your Google Account using the storage manager.

What is the most common Gmail password? ›

According to a study by NordPass, the most commonly used passwords include “123456”, “123456789”, “qwerty”, “password”, and “111111”.

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