What is the alternative to Gmail? Genuinely interested.
I'd be willing to switch if I found a future-proof email solution for both personal and business usage.
Step 1, get a custom domain so you can migrate providers easily. It costs like 6€ a year, definitely worth it.
Step 2, Fastmail, Protonmail M$, ... will be happy to offer you email for few € a month. If you'd desperately need to save money on that, there is Czech provider Seznam.cz that offers email on custom domain for free. Only issue is that the registration is in Czech, but Google Translate your friend: https://emailprofi.seznam.cz/login It's like a biggest local internet company, not totally random provider, so should not just steal data or disappear right away and works reasonably.
I just use my own domain and then forward incoming email to whatever service. This way it doesn't really matter what I use: if I get locked out I simply change the forwarding email. It's free with most providers.
Seriously? Fastmail is awesome and so much better than gmail. And I'm sure there are plenty of good alternatives as well, this just happens to be the one I use.
Protonmail is a really solid solution as long as you have your own domain. It's pretty privacy focused and has worked well for me for a decent while. They've got a decent VPN service as well (I think it comes bundled with Protonmail at some tier level) and they just recently rolled out a beta for their Google Drive replacement.
All in all I've enjoyed their services. Their security/E2E Encryption support is nice (could still use a bit more functionality though) and they are definitely a lot more FOSS friendly than Google when it comes to actually using their services.
And, to boot, as frustratingly low as their free usage tier limits are, the fact that they openly publish them and that they are quite low tells me that they're at least being realistic about what they can offer without monetizing the service in other ways.
I actually pay for ProtonMail now and I'm in the process of moving all my communication to it. My Google account will stick around, but I'm diversifying my dependencies and it feels so good.
Never had a problem, and allows up to 3 aliases at a time that can actually be completely different instead of Gmail's useless HeyLookAtMyRealAddressEveryone+Alias@gmail.com
I've been very happy with kolabnow.com services for a biz email acct, and I'm likely to switch personal over there too. Not free, but inexpensive, FOSS, Private, Swiss-located, and really solid service and support. Among a ~dozen others I've tried or still using, Kolab is the best of the lot.
(&yes, I use Gmail for junk or transactional stuff; need the acct for an Android mobile, and their UI is a horrific kludge of UI conceits trying to showcase their 'mad design skilz' - yuk!)
When this question is asked, there's always a hundred people eagerly telling you to switch to Fastmail, forgetting that 14 years ago, everyone was saying switch to Gmail because it was the good option.
I would just suggest people think about what might happen if Fastmail gets enough of a userbase to be the next Gmail.
14 years ago, Google was a very different company. I don't think it's reasonable to criticise people for not seeing what they would become that far in advance.
I agree with you, I just caution that they may not have become what they are today if we didn't all flock to Google. Fastmail is good today, will they be good if they become the dominant player?
I use Office365. Yes it costs money, and yes they provide good support. I also use Outlook so ALL my mail, both sent and received are stored locally and remotely. If my mail bombs I lose max a couple hours' worth of email.
If you can tolerate a completely different way of doing email, I wholeheartedly recommend HEY[0]. I've been a customer since it went live and their business model is very straightforward. You pay $99, you get email for a year. Their track record running Basecamp instills confidence in the longevity of the service and that they won't sell out their customers.
I honestly think it's a much better approach to email. One of the key issues with having an email address is that anyone who knows it is granted permission to get your attention, whereas with HEY you get rid of that problem for the most part but without having to 'program' your inbox.
What is the alternative to Gmail? Genuinely interested. I'd be willing to switch if I found a future-proof email solution for both personal and business usage.