Just a little at a time. Most sites let you change your email. As you get a message from a site move it to your other email.

You're using a password manager right? Just iterate through the entries in your password manager updating.

Start by changing your most important services to your new email, and set your gmail to forward everything to your new email. From then, sign up to new sites with your new email and change emails of old accounts if you have time, it's not a huge rush.

As long as you set up the email forwarding, you've done most of the important work right there.

I transitioned e-mail address twice. What has worked for me is doing it slowly. Keep the old address around: from time to time you'll get emails from services you did not even remember being subscribed to. Also, if you don't use a password manager, now it's the perfect time to start. I suggest Bitwaden

*Lose

You could literally destroy me financially or other ways by just gaining login to my gmail.

Sounds like you need to start using MFA.

Less of a leap and more of a careful crawl. Use nee email for new services, and deactivate old accounts if possible. I have yet to selfhost email, but for hosted options proton and tutanota are better than gmail for easily. The issue with selfhosting email is that it is easy to get blacklisted iirc.

You have to accept that privacy costs money because your data isn't being sold. For $5+ a month you can use proton Mail or tutanota. For ~$2 a month you can use Zoho mail or Titan mail.

Whatever you choose, it will be worth it.

Consider getting your own domain. That way you own your own name, but you can swap email providers behind the scenes

I'm still transitioning to gmail from my hotmail accounts....

Doesn't take nearly as long as you'd think if you start to slowly transition stuff to the new address.

I'm thinking about this every once in a while. What about using a custom domain and a relay service like FireFox Relay or Addy.io? That would give you the option to move your actual email around easily, even after you lose access to it.

I switched to Fastmail a few months ago and love it.

My tip is: Start simple.

1. If you have any other Domains forwarded to Gmail forward them to Fastmail instead.
2. Forward Gmail to Fastmail (i.e. add as an account including importing old mails). This won't get you off Google yet, but at least a backup and you can practically stop using Gmail.
3. For any new registration, use Fastmail (or any of its random emails etc.)
4. Slowly transition your old accounts.

I found this easier than expected. I was already in the habit of not using my main personal account for online signups etc - just for friends and family. So i setup forwarding for the important contacts first. If I get a fwded mail i make sure I respond from the new one so they have it . There were still some services using gmail - utility companies etc. I switched each of those to other addresses using a redirector - at first simplelogin , now hide my email (but probably going to switch again). I left the gmail live for now. Downloaded everything using GoogleTakeaway. I havent yet closed it down so not sure what that involves yet, but Im not dependent on it now.

It might seem daunting at first, but get started and gradually move stuff to your new address. It does sound like you live in a place where this might be easier said than done saying that. Maybe the gmail address stays live only with a few final gov services (dont forget to filter and fwd them).

Before you change your accounts over to your new email, use email aliases like anonaddy or simplelogin for your online accounts.

Just change the email address for all your accounts where it's possible to change it. In your GMail settings forward all incoming emails to your new email adress.

Most websites don't let you change the email? Just create a new account then.

You have to make some sacrifices to get away from having your entire identity online tied to Google. Be willing to have some downsides to get upsides.

Start with one site at a time, and if a site/service doesn’t allow you to change your email without contacting them, make a note of it, and don’t worry about it for now. To begin with, focus on the sites that you can change yourself. This will give you a sense of making progress, perhaps faster than you might think.

I started switching off of gmail about 4 years ago and I’m still checking it periodically. Most of the messages I get to my gmail account these days are spam or mistaken emails due to people signing up for services and thinking that my email address is theirs (I have an early “first initial/last name” gmail address that I got in 2005). But every once in a while something legit will pop up and I make it a point to change the address.

I don’t know if I’ll ever actually close my gmail account or stop checking it, but at this point I’ve got 99%+ of the services I care about switched over to my new address, so if Google boots me, I won’t care.

I have my Gmail since beta invites so over 20 years. I'm dying with that account it's basically my Internet SSN at this point. It's also my real name so it's professional n shit. The idea of moving it would be a disaster.

Some e-mail providers (like Proton for example) allow you to import your e-mails and contacts from gmail - that's a start. You probably have all your passwords saved in browser/manager so you will know where to go to update them - unfortunately I don't think there's an automated way to do it, but it probably seems like more hassle than it actually is. I'd also search your mailbox for keywords like "welcome" or "account" to see if there are any other services you forgot you signed up for and haven't saved the password in browser/manager.

After all is migrated and updated, you would probably want to delete your google account but I wouldn't do that right away, just to give yourself some extra time in case you forgot about something. Log out of all google services and stop using them. Set a reminder for 1 year from now to delete the account.

Use your own domain for the migration. That means if you ever move again you won't have to do this again. You can just point the domain at a new email service.

what email client do you use? I bought a domain with the exact same goal in mind, but I'm kinda new to self hosting / homelabs stuff and everywhere I look makes self hosting email seem extremely complicated

Currently in transition. I have about 300ish accounts to change the email handles but i set myself a goal of at least 10 a day, more if I feel like it. Its a journey not a race take your time. In the mean time though you should be backing up anything important off of your account if you havent already like contacts, photos, files and messages. That should help with your nerves, at least it did with me.

I moved from gmail. Best thing to do is use an email aliasing service like anonaddy, all my aliases forward to a Tutanota email, but if Tutanota decides to do something drastic, I'm able to change where each email address points to.

I frequently encounter people asking about moving from Gmail but I never understand, please help me understand if I'm wrong. Doesn't Gmail still let you forward emails to a 3rd party address? In which case just sign up for another email service and you're done. Email is a standard, not a service. I've changed email addresses probably about as many times as years I've been alive, it's probably the least likely service I could think of that you could be tied in to. Am I missing something huge here?