How to set @icloud.com mail alias as your Apple ID?

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How to set @icloud.com mail alias as your Apple ID?

An Apple account is identified by its Apple ID, which for a long standing account, has a lot of information associated with it. However, people grow up, get married, change their names. Not everyone wants to set up a new Apple ID when that happens. However, an account handle set up years ago can become irrelevant over time.

Apple IDs can already be changed if you use a 3rd party email address or have a mail alias that ends in @me.com or @mac.com (https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202667#appleaddress). However, how do you do the same for a mail alias that ends in @icloud.com?

Posted on Sep 1, 2019 1:08 AM

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Answer 1

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Roger Wilmut1

Level 10

131,326 points

Sep 1, 2019 1:46 AM in response to UrsaDK

Just to clarify:

If your ID is a non-Apple address you can change it to your main @icloud.com address, or to the @me.com or @mac.com versions if they exist (however those would already be the ID).

If your ID is an @icloud.com, @mac.com or @me.com address you can only change it to one of the others, not to a third-party address.

If you have created ain 'email alias' - an additional address - you cannot make that into your ID.

But I would second KP's comment about not using your @icloud.com address as the login. It's not a good idea for your login to be the same as the address you give out to people. People who started with DotMac or MobileMe and thus have one of those addresses as the ID anyway don't have the option of changing it to a third-party address, which is unfortunate.

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Answer 2

UrsaDK Author

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Sep 1, 2019 3:22 AM in response to Roger Wilmut1

To eliminate any possible confusion, my Apple ID ends in @icloud.com. The account is not associated with any @me.com or @mac.com email addresses. When I talk about "email aliases", I am talking about additional email addresses that are defined in the Preferences pane of iCloud 's Mail web app.

Roger Wilmut1 wrote:

There may be a technical issue over email aliases. They can't be moved to another account (even after deleting them), or logged in with on the account they belong to.

I imagine that this restriction is most certainly a result of a technical limitation. But given enough support, technical limitations can be overcome. After all, the ability to change an Apple ID from a 3rd party email address to an email address that ends with @icloud.com was not alway available, either.

All we can do is ask questions, submit feature requests via Feedback - iCloud - Apple, and hope that the missing feature would at some point be implemented.

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Answer 3

King_Penguin

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334,192 points

Sep 1, 2019 1:34 AM in response to UrsaDK

That page also says you can use icloud.com, not just me.com and mac.com. If it's not just an alias to the proper iCloud.com email address what happens when you try ? I get the “This is an alias of your Apple ID email address.” on mine, which implies I can use mine as the primary email address (I'm not going to confirm it as I wouldn't be able to change it back to my third-party email address).

But personally I wouldn't use my iCloud email address as the primary email address on my account - if you forget the account's password, or if the account is hacked/locked, you won't be able to access the email account to access reset emails.

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Answer 4

UrsaDK Author

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Sep 1, 2019 2:30 AM in response to King_Penguin

King_Penguin wrote:

… I'm not going to confirm it as I wouldn't be able to change it back to my third-party email address. …

You hit the nail on the head there. It is possible to do this when your current Apple ID is set to a 3rd party email address. But my current Apple ID ends in @icloud.com and the option to change it to a mail alias that ends in @icloud.com simply does not appear.

From what I could gather, this would be possible if my email alias (ie: additional email address setup on the account) ended in @me.com or @mac.com. But alas, this functionality is not available for mail aliases ending in @icloud.com.

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Answer 5

UrsaDK Author

Level 1

17 points

Sep 1, 2019 2:50 AM in response to Roger Wilmut1

My current Apple ID is an @icloud.com account, which I am trying to change to a mail alias (an additional email address setup on the same account) that ends in @icloud.com. I guess my original post didn't make this very clear.

Roger Wilmut1 wrote:

If your ID is an @icloud.com, @mac.com or @me.com address you can only change it to one of the others

To expand on what you already said above, if your Apple ID ends in @icloud.com then you can change it to a @mac.com or @me.com mail alias setup on the same account. However, you can not change it to a mail alias that ends in @icloud.com.

For some reason @icloud.com email aliases are excluded from this operation.

Roger Wilmut1 wrote:

If you have created ain 'email alias' - an additional address - you cannot make that into your ID.

I believe that it would be very helpful indeed if this functionality was updated. I imagine there is a plethora of Apple Users who would benefit immensely from being able to evolve their account with their changing live circumstances. Circumstances that do not necessarily fall under the existing exception rules, such "Legal change of name" and "Apple ID contains a profanity".

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Answer 6

Sep 1, 2019 2:55 AM in response to UrsaDK

UmkaDK wrote:

From what I could gather, this would be possible if my email alias (ie: additional email address setup on the account) ended in @me.com or @mac.com. But alas, this functionality is not available for mail aliases ending in @icloud.com.

There's a lot of confusion because Apple insist on using the term 'alias' both for 'email aliases' - the additional addresses ' - and the different versions of the initially created email address (e.g. @me.com, @mac.com) where these exist.

If your ID is the original address and has more than one version (i.e. the same text before the '@') you can sign in with the others, or make them officially the ID. So if your ID is xxx@me.com you can also use the xxx@icloud.com version. (If your ID is xxx@icloud.com you won't have the @me.com or @mac.com versions.)

You cannot make an 'email alias' - i.e. an additional email address with a different text before the '@ - into an ID no matter what it ends in.

EDIT: your post above was posted while I was still writing this one.

There may be a technical issue over email aliases. They can't be moved to another account (even after deleting them), or logged in with on the account they belong to.

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Answer 7

King_Penguin

Level 10

334,192 points

Sep 1, 2019 2:36 AM in response to UrsaDK

If you've changed it the Apple ID's iCloud.com email address you won't be able to change it. If you want to know why you would have to ask Apple.

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How to set @icloud.com mail alias as your Apple ID?

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