It is good idea to backup gmail emails for different reasons. It is possible that after these months of teleworking and confinement, you have seen how your work and personal email account was filled with hundreds of messages until (at least in my case) they even reached the entire available space of Gmail. And it is that in many occasions we will not be able to simply erase to create more space.
That is why today we want to review the functions of Google Takeout, which will allow us to make a backup of Gmail, with all messages and attachments, with a simple, fast, totally safe and free method.
How to backup Gmail emails
Although it may seem strange, this process is not carried out directly from the Gmail application itself, but we will have to access the settings of our Google account, using the account linked to this email account on which we want to make the copy of security.
- Once here, without even having to navigate, we should see a small section in the central part called “Privacy and personalization”, with a highlighted line that reads “Manage your data and personalization options”, on which we will click.
- Scrolling down a little in this window, we will reach the section “Download, delete or create a plan for data data”, within which we will find this first option to “Download your data”.
- Next, we will only have to select (or rather deselect, since they will all be checked by default) all the data linked to the account that we want to save, which will include all the activity and preferences of our Google account. In this case, looking only to save the emails, we will select the “Unmark all” option, exclusively marking the “Email” option to create a backup copy of the messages and attachments of our Gmail account.
- Going down to the bottom of the page, we will click on the “Next step” button to continue with the process.
- Finally, we will only have to choose the method in which we want to receive this backup, selecting the arrow under “Delivery method” to see your options, including options such as a direct download link, an email, or the saved in our associated Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive or Box accounts .
- Once finished, we just have to click on “Create export. “
Note that this method will not only be useful for making occasional or manual backups, but we can also establish the creation of recurring automatic backups, with periods every two months and up to one year, as well as the ability to choose the file type and maximum file size (receiving several partitions of the same in case the resulting copy is larger). In this way we can backup Gmail emails and secure our data.
In addition, in the case of wanting to make a backup copy of the Gmail account of a company, we may require that the administrator of the same enable the Takeout functions previously.
