I switched from Gmail to Proton Mail, and not just because of privacy

Calvin Wankhede / Android Authority

Here’s a scary thought: Google probably knows me better than my own mother. Between my emails in Gmail, images in Photos, all my online searches, personal Gemini conversations, files stored in my Drive account, and all the data the company collects from other Google apps I use, it can create a surprisingly accurate profile of me. The more it gets to know me, the better it gets at showing me ads that may grab my attention, which in turn will boost their profits. I get the business behind it, I just don’t like it.

I want privacy. Period. Google won’t give it to me, so I started looking elsewhere. I already ditched Google Drive and Photos for Proton Drive, and while I was initially skeptical of moving away from Gmail since I just cleaned it up, Proton Mail quickly managed to convince me to jump ship, for several reasons.

What matters most to you in an email service? 25 votes Privacy and encryption 48 % Features and convenience 28 % Free storage space 20 % Integration with other apps 4 %

Privacy first, but you have to understand the limits

Calvin Wankhede / Android Authority

Proton is all about privacy, but Mail is probably the least private app it offers. It’s not the company’s fault, though — it’s just how email works.

Thanks to end-to-end encryption, Proton can’t read the content of my emails. It can still see some metadata like sender and recipient addresses — that’s just how email routing works — but the actual content of my messages is encrypted and invisible to it. That’s a stark contrast to my Gmail account, where Google can see everything, including the content, and is constantly scanning my emails to provide specific features like Smart Reply.

So from that perspective, Proton is definitely safer and more private than Gmail, but that’s not the whole story. Proton’s encryption only truly works when I send a message to another Proton user. When that happens, all the data is stored on Proton’s servers, making it completely private. But as soon as I send an email to someone who has a Gmail account, Google can basically still see everything on their end, as that’s something Proton has no control over.

This was one of the reasons that held me back from switching to Proton, as complete privacy isn’t really possible outside of Proton accounts, at least at first glance. I’ve been dealing with email for almost 20 years and I don’t think I’ve ever sent one to a Proton user.

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