Proton Easy Switch Keeps Your Gmail Address Alive

Proton Mail’s Easy Switch now sends and receives Gmail from inside Proton, while that mailbox stays live on Google’s servers. The company shipped the Gmail connection on May 28, 2026, as a slow exit rather than a cutoff.

Proton’s own pages are blunt about the trade. Until you change the address, Google still handles the mail that lands on @gmail.com, and most replies still travel out through Gmail.

Proton Mail Now Speaks Gmail

Easy Switch used to copy a mailbox once. The May update turned it into a live link. Recent Gmail threads land in Proton, new mail to the Gmail address keeps showing up there, and the composer can send as that same Gmail address.

Proton’s pitch is that you no longer open the Gmail app, so Google loses the extra data that app collects, including approximate location used for ads. Connecting Gmail does not hand Google your Proton inbox. Friends who also connect Gmail to Proton can even get end-to-end encryption on messages that still show @gmail.com.

That last part is the product hiding in the migration tool. Proton is not only moving people off Google. It is trying to encrypt conversations that still use Gmail addresses, as long as both sides sit on Proton. On June 17, 2026 it added Easy Switch for Business for Google Workspace, a separate path that runs both suites at once. The personal Gmail connection still does not support Workspace or custom domains hosted on Google.

Proton Mail also still imports from Outlook, Yahoo, and Apple Mail. Only Gmail gets the ongoing send-and-receive hook. Older one-click Gmail forwarding is now the legacy path, kept for people who need the same Gmail box pushed into more than one Proton account.

Google Still Reads the Mail You Did Not Encrypt

Proton said the quiet part in the same launch note that sold the feature. Using Gmail from inside Proton does not fix the privacy problem that made people want to leave.

Google is still reading every email received by your Gmail account, including any sensitive personal communications you might receive there.

Proton, You Can Now Use Your Gmail Account in Proton Mail

Inbound mail still arrives at Google first. Proton then pulls a copy, strips trackers, ads, and spam, and stores that copy with zero-access encryption. Actions you take in Proton do not change the copy that remains in Gmail. Delete or archive a forwarded message in Proton and the Gmail original stays put.

Proton is still reading every email received as a warning, not a footnote. The company tells users to move Netflix, Amazon, banks, and other logins onto a Proton address until Gmail is “only getting your spam,” then disconnect and delete the Google account. The tool that makes the first week easy also makes that last step easy to postpone.

Legacy forwarding even hides the Proton destination from Google. Proton says Google can see that a Proton app connected to the account, and cannot see where the copies go. The Gmail mailbox itself remains Google’s.

What End-to-End Encryption Covers, and What It Does Not

Send as Gmail from Proton and the privacy result depends on the other person’s address. Proton encrypts the message when the recipient is on Proton, including someone whose @gmail.com address is connected to a Proton account. Everyone else is a different path.

WHO CAN READ A CONNECTED GMAIL MESSAGE

Those non-Proton replies also land in Gmail’s Sent folder. Google has the outbound copy even if you never open Gmail again. Proton’s advice is to ask friends and family to connect their Gmail too, so a Gmail-looking thread can still be encrypted. That is a network strategy, not an exit.

A one-time import is the cleaner cut if the goal is to stop feeding Google new mail. Copy the archive, change the addresses that matter, and leave the live connection off. The live bridge is for people who want Proton’s inbox while contacts still write to @gmail.com.

January 2027 Ends Gmail’s Send as for Other Inboxes

Google is closing the reverse trick. From January 2027, Gmail on the web and in the Gmail apps will no longer send mail as a Yahoo, Outlook, Hotmail, or other non-Google address. Gmailify and fetching other inboxes with POP on the web go at the same time. Gmail-to-Gmail aliases and Google Workspace Send as stay.

The notice window sits in the third quarter of 2026, with a transition through the fourth quarter when new setups may already be blocked. Proton treated that shift as an opening. On August 14, 2026 it pointed people at Easy Switch as the way to send from Gmail without opening Gmail at all.

Proton Mail's Easy Switch lets you send from your Gmail address without opening Gmail at all, and strips trackers and spy pixels from anything that lands in your Proton inbox. Learn more: https://t.co/DEgXCqsMiF

— Proton Mail (@ProtonMail) August 14, 2026

THE HUB SWAP ON THE CALENDAR

1. May 28, 2026: Proton turns Easy Switch into a live Gmail send-and-receive connection.
2. June 17, 2026: Proton ships Easy Switch for Business so firms can run Google Workspace and Proton side by side during a move.
3. Q3 2026: Google starts in-product notices that third-party Send as support ends.
4. Q3-Q4 2026: Existing Send as, Gmailify, and web POP setups keep working, while new ones may be restricted.
5. January 2027: Gmail removes third-party Send as, Gmailify, and web POP fetch.

What does not change is the other direction. Desktop clients can still reach Gmail, because IMAP and SMTP stay supported, along with the Gmail API. Thunderbird, Apple Mail, and Outlook can keep reading a Gmail account. Google is stopping Gmail from acting as the front end for other brands. Proton is volunteering to be the front end for Gmail.

The Login Address That Never Moves

The hard part of leaving Gmail was never the inbox. It was the address printed on bank letters, shop logins, and old business cards. Easy Switch answers that by leaving the address in place, which is also why Gmail’s biggest lock-in survives the first week of using Proton.

ACCOUNTS THAT STILL POINT AT GMAIL

• Money and ID: Banks, tax offices, health portals, and anything tied to a card still send one-time codes to the old address until you change it.
• Shops and streams: Proton names Netflix and Amazon as the kind of logins to move, because each one left on Gmail is another feed into Google’s profile.
• People: Contacts keep writing to @gmail.com unless you tell them otherwise, which is the whole reason the composer can send as Gmail.
• The Google account itself: Drive, Photos, and YouTube do not move when Easy Switch connects mail. Proton points people at Google Takeout, then at Proton Drive, before any deletion.

Proton’s paid plans add a short @pm.me address and hide-my-email aliases, which helps for new signups. They do not rewrite the Gmail address already stored at your bank. Newsletters view in Proton is there to surface subscriptions you forgot, not to change them for you.

One Gmail Connection on a Free Plan

The bridge is open to free and paid Proton Mail users, with tight caps. Workspace Gmail and Google-hosted custom domains cannot use the personal connection at all. If you created a Proton VPN or Proton Pass account with that same Gmail address, the mail link is blocked until Proton finishes a fix it says is in progress.

PLAN LIMITS FOR A GMAIL CONNECTION

• Free tier: One Gmail account, on a mailbox with 1 GB of storage.
• Paid plans: Up to three Gmail accounts, counting leftover legacy forwards toward the same cap.
• First import: Easy Switch copies recent mail up to 80% of available Proton storage, then lets you pull the rest, including windows of the last 1, 3, 6, or 12 months.
• Contacts: Google contacts import as-is, up to 10,000, with calendar events landing in a new Proton calendar unless you merge them.

That 80% cap is why a free mailbox can feel full the same day you connect. You can undo the import later and keep the live Gmail link, which is the right move if you only wanted sending and forwarding. Easy Switch skips duplicates if you run an import twice. It asks you to customise first if a Gmail folder name runs past 100 characters, if the old account has more than 2,000 folders, or if a label collides with one Proton already uses.

Forwarding only copies Gmail’s Inbox. Filters that skip the inbox never reach Proton. Mail Gmail has already filed as spam should stay put, and messages you send from Gmail to yourself are not forwarded. Grant every Google permission on the OAuth screen or the setup errors out. Sending is exclusive: one Gmail address can connect to one Proton account at a time.

Disconnecting Is the Step Most People Skip

Proton still lists a finish line. Update the logins that matter, export Google data, remove the Gmail connection under Import via Easy Switch, then delete the Google account. Until that last pair of clicks, Easy Switch is a Proton window on a Gmail identity.

Proton says it is trusted by over 100 million users and more than 100,000 businesses, after more than 12 years of selling encrypted mail from Switzerland. Those figures measure accounts on Proton, not people who have actually cut Gmail. The May tool makes the first group easier to grow than the second.

Keep the connection if you need the old address alive while you change banks and shops. Drop it once Gmail is a junk trap. The privacy gain Proton sold only starts after the Gmail address stops being the one the world still writes to.