Automatically forward Gmail messages to another account

You can choose to forward all of your new messages to another email address, or only forward certain types of messages.

Learn how automatic forwarding works

• After you add a forwarding email address, we send a verification link to the address.
• After you verify, you can forward messages to that email address.
• We forward all new messages to the account, except for spam.
• To forward messages that match a specific criteria, you can create a filter.
• To choose what happens to the copy of an incoming email, you can:
  • Save a copy in your inbox.
  • Automatically archive the copy.

Turn on automatic forwarding

1. On your computer, open Gmail.
2. Sign in to the account where you want to forward messages from.
3. In the top right, click Settings See all settings.
4. Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP or Forwarding tab.
5. In the "Forwarding" section, click Add a forwarding address.
6. Enter the email address you want to forward messages to.
7. Click Next Proceed OK.
   • A verification message is sent to the forwarding email address.
8. In the other email account, click the verification link in the message.
9. Return to the "Settings" page in Gmail.
10. Refresh your browser.
11. Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP or Forwarding tab.
12. In the "Forwarding" section, select Forward a copy of incoming mail to.
13. Choose what you want to happen with the Gmail copy of your emails.
    • It’s recommended you select Keep Gmail's copy in the Inbox.
14. At the bottom of the page, click Save Changes.

Turn off automatic forwarding

1. On your computer, open Gmail.
2. Sign in to the account that's forwarding your emails.
3. In the top right, click Settings See all settings.
4. Click the Forwarding and POP/IMAP or Forwarding tab.
5. In the "Forwarding" section, click Disable forwarding.
6. At the bottom, click Save Changes.

Forward messages that match your filters

Important: By default, automatic forwarding sends all your Gmail messages to the new address. To forward specific messages, turn off automatic forwarding and set up a filter to choose which messages get sent.

1. On your computer, open Gmail.
2. At the top, in the search box, click Show search options .
3. Enter your search criteria.
   • To check that your search works, click Search.
4. At the bottom of the search window, click Create filter.
5. From the list of filter options, click Forward it.
6. Select the forwarding email address.
7. Click Create filter.

Tip: To forward messages to multiple accounts, create a filter for every forwarding email address.

Learn about forwarding notices

"You are forwarding your email to [email address]"

If you set up automatic forwarding, you get this notice for the first week after you turned on forwarding. This is a reminder that forwarding is turned on, and gives you a chance to review your forwarding settings.

If you turn off forwarding, the notice goes away.

"You are forwarding your email to [email address] and your filters are also forwarding some of your email"

If you created a filter that forwards certain messages to another email address, you get this notice in your inbox for the first week after you set up the filter. This is a reminder that forwarding is turned on, and gives you a chance to review your forwarding settings.

If you change your filter to stop forwarding messages, the notice goes away.

There's a forwarding notice & you didn't set up forwarding

If you see a forwarding notice, but never set it up on your account, follow these steps:

1. Change your password immediately. Someone else might have access to your Gmail account. Learn how to change your password.
2. From the “Settings” page in Gmail, turn off forwarding.

Related resources

• Check emails from other accounts
• Best practices for forwarding email to Gmail