W ITH HACKERS AND Data brokers desperately coveting your email address, it’s important to keep your private data safe. With Apple’s Hide My Email feature, you can create unlimited unique email addresses wherever you log in. Anything sent to these addresses is automatically forwarded to your personal inbox, and any replies you send will instead appear to come from the Hide My Email address.
This ensures your primary email address doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. If an address created by Hide My Email gets leaked, you can just disable it, and because Hide My Email creates a new address for each app and account you use, none of your other logins will be affected.
It’s built into “Sign in with Apple” and iCloud+, which means you need a paid subscription to access it. You’ll also need macOS 12 (Monterey) or later, macOS 12.1 or later for Hide My Email in Mail, and macOS 14 (Sonoma) or later for Hide My Email with Apple Pay. Let’s see how it all works.
How to hide my email in apps
1. Set up in Safari
In Safari, click the email address field, then select Hide My Email. This will automatically create a random email address for you. Click the refresh arrow if you want to change it, and you can add a note if you like, then click Use.
2. Manage with Mail
In Mail, create a new message. Hover over the From field, click the drop-down menu, and pick Hide My Email. This only works when you send messages to one person — you can’t use it when emailing multiple people.
3. Sort more apps
You can use Hide My Email in third–party apps, too. When an app asks you to create an account, pick the “Sign in with Apple” option (it might be labeled “Continue with Apple”), then select Hide My Email and continue.
HOW TO Create and manage addresses:
1. Create an address
To manually create an address, open System Settings and go to [Your Name] > iCloud > Hide My Email. Click the “+” in the bottom–left, followed by Continue, add a label and note if you like, and then click Continue > Done.
2. Check forwarding
Pick an address from the list, then switch off Forward To. This will stop any emails being forwarded. Or click the gear icon (bottom left), and pick Change Forwarding Address to choose which inbox your redirected mail is sent to.
3. Disable an address
In the list of addresses, click “Deactivate email address” to disable an address. To reactivate it, click the gear icon (bottom left), then select Show Inactive Addresses. Choose one, then click “Reactivate address” > Reactivate
HOW TO Use Hide My Email with Apple Pay and iCloud
1. Enable for Apple Pay
To enable Hide My Email when you use Apple Pay, open System Settings and go to Wallet & Apple Pay, then turn on Hide My Email. You’ll need to have an associated payment card. If you don’t, add one by clicking Add Card.
2. Protect payments
When the Apple Pay payment sheet next appears, click Contact > Hide My Email to protect your personal email address. If this option doesn’t appear, the payment site doesn’t need your email address for payment.
3. Edit on iCloud.com
On iCloud.com, click the grid of dots in the top–right corner, then click Hide My Email. Here, you can see and edit accounts that are using the feature, deactivate email addresses, change the forwarding inbox, and more.
> HIDE MY EMAIL ON YOUR IPHONE
Hide My Email can also be used in iOS and iPadOS in much the same way as macOS. Apple will automatically create Hide My Email addresses for you, but you can manage them — including creating new addresses, deactivating and reactivating them, changing the forwarding inbox, and more — within the Settings app. Just tap your name at the top and go to iCloud > Hide My Email. And as we mentioned previously, Hide My Email settings can also be accessed from iCloud.com, meaning you can tweak how it works no matter what device you’re using.
Source: MacLife magazine, March 2025. Go to the magazine for more useful tips on your Apple products.