G Suite remains free for personal use, while retaining a custom email address

The free Google G Suite version will still be available to existing users who use the software for personal use. This means that they are not obliged to switch to Google Workspace. Companies have to make that paid switch.

Details on how to keep the free G Suite edition recently appeared on Google’s website, after the company indicated in January that a free option would be available for existing users. This applies to individuals and families who use G Suite for non-commercial purposes. They can indicate that they do not want to switch to Google Workspace. You can do that in the G Suite admin panel. Google advises users to do this before August 1, otherwise their accounts will be suspended. After that time, you must switch to Google Workspace or contact support to reactivate the G Suite account.

This free option is not available to new users, nor to businesses. Companies must permanently switch to Workspace by June 27, 2022. Private users who made this switch after January 17 and now want to go back to G Suite can contact Google Workspace support to revert their account to the free version, writes 9to5Google.

With this G Suite edition, users can access Google services such as Gmail, Drive, and Meet through their G Suite account. With that, they also keep their purchases in the Play Store. Previously, users had to switch to Workspace to do that; otherwise their account would be suspended. It is also still possible to use your own domain name with Gmail. Google previously said that users who switch to a free account would lose paid features. It was expected that custom e-mail addresses would also fall under this, but this appears not to be the case.

Google announced early this year that it would discontinue its free G Suite version. Users therefore had to switch to the paid Workspace suite, or would lose access to their account. The company later came back to this and earlier postponed the deadline for a switch to Workspace.