The setup is pretty simple. And in this article, I’ll show you how to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- forward all incoming email<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- forward only certain messages<\/strong> using a filter<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Gmail Text Alerts: Table of Contents<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Getting Started with Email-To-Text Forwarding<\/a>\n
- \n
- Step 1: Create your text.email account<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Step 2: Add your text.email address as a forwarding address in Gmail<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Step 3: Confirm the forwarding address<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Step 4: Finish setting up the forwarding in Gmail<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- (Optional) Step 5: Customize the SMS format<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Ready to Get Started with Gmail-to-Text?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Getting Started with Email-to-Text Forwarding<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
text.email gives you a special email address like:
your-number@subdomain.text.email<\/code>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhenever any email goes to that address, text.email converts it into a text message and delivers it to your phone<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So if you forward any email from your regular Gmail account to that address, you’ll get it as an SMS alert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Step 1: Create your text.email account<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The first step here is creating your text.email account. (Which you can do on the text.email<\/a> website.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After you create your account, you’ll get your email subdomain. You need that so text.email knows you’re authorized to send email-to-text messages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
(Without it, anyone could send messages to your phone \u2014 and obviously we don’t want that. In fact, that’s why AT&T<\/a>, Verizon<\/a>, T-Mobile<\/a>, and all the rest of the cell phone carriers stopped<\/em> offering email-to-text<\/a> services.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
text.email will automatically assign you a subdomain, but you can change it in your account settings<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-pickingkeyword-tinified-1024x648.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nSo if your phone number is
5551234567<\/code> and you make your subdomainacme<\/code>, your address would be:5551234567@acme.text.email<\/code>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nCopy down your address, since we’ll need that for Gmail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Step 2: Add your text.email address as a forwarding address in Gmail<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Head to Gmail (this is much<\/em> easier to do in the desktop version than on mobile, so I’ll show the instructions that way).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Click the gear icon<\/strong>.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Click See all settings<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Open the Forwarding and POP\/IMAP<\/strong> tab<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Click Add a forwarding address<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Enter your
your-number@subdomain<\/code>.text.email<\/code> address<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-enterforwardingaddress-tinified-1024x648.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nStep 3: Confirm the forwarding address<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
After you add the forwarding address, Gmail sends a verification message<\/strong> to that address before it lets you forward mail there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When Gmail sends that verification message, text.email receives it and turns it into a text message to your phone<\/strong>. The text contains Gmail\u2019s confirmation link. You tap the link, confirm ownership, and that part is done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Step 4: Finish setting up the forwarding in Gmail<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
After confirming the address, go back to Gmail:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- Return to Settings<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Go back to Forwarding and POP\/IMAP<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Choose Forward a copy of incoming mail to<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Select your text.email forwarding address<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Choose what Gmail should do with its own copy<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Click Save Changes<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-finishforwarding-tinified-1024x655.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nAt that point, you have two choices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Option 1: Forward all incoming Gmail messages<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
If you want every email to trigger a text, you can stop here. Every new Gmail message will be forwarded to your text.email address and turned into an SMS alert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now… we really<\/em> wouldn’t recommend this unless your inbox is:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- \n
- a dedicated alert inbox<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- a work inbox with only high-priority mail<\/li>\n\n\n\n
- an inbox that only receives email so valuable you must have all of it come in as text messages<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
Otherwise, you’re going to go WAY overboard on texts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Option 2: Forward only important emails with a Gmail filter<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
For most people, you’ll want to set up a filter<\/strong> so only specific emails are transformed into text messages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So on the main page in Gmail, click the little slider buttons next to the search bar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/textalertreplies-filtericon-tinified-1024x157.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nThat will bring up the filtering settings. Set up the filter you want. For instance, in the screenshot below, I wanted to only get messages where someone replied to my message offering them a no-risk free trial. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-setupfilter-tinified-1024x557.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nThen click Create filter<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That will bring up a new set of options for what you want to do with email that matches your filter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Check the box next to Forward it to<\/strong> and choose your text.email address from the dropdown. (If you don’t see that address, go back through the earlier steps where we set up the forwarding address to make sure they all worked correctly.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-chooseaddress-tinified-1024x644.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nNow click the Create filter<\/strong> button.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You’ll have to give Google another round of permissions (they’re pretty precious about filtering), but that’s the last step. Your filter is all set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
(Optional) Step 5: Customize the SMS format<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Now… you don’t have to have your entire emails forwarded word-for-word as text messages<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- Go back to Forwarding and POP\/IMAP<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Click See all settings<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Step 2: Add your text.email address as a forwarding address in Gmail<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- Step 1: Create your text.email account<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
- forward only certain messages<\/strong> using a filter<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/text.email\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/gmailtext-smsformatting-tinified-1024x648.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n