Email Alias Services Reviewed: SimpleLogin, Hide My Email, and Firefox Relay

Every store, app, and newsletter wants your email address. Once it is in a company’s database, it can be sold, leaked in a breach, or flooded with spam and scams. An email alias fixes that. It is a separate, random-looking address that forwards mail to your real inbox. If one alias starts getting junk, you switch it off. Your real address stays private.

This review is part of our Privacy Toolkit. We compared three alias services using each company’s own pages and help articles, checked October 6, 2026. We don’t earn a commission from links in this review.

The three services compared

SimpleLogin

Owned by Proton. The free plan gives you 10 aliases with unlimited forwarding and lets you reply from the alias, so the store never sees your real address even when you write back. Premium costs $36 a year or $4 a month and adds unlimited aliases, your own custom domain, and more mailboxes. If you cancel, your existing aliases keep working; you just can’t create more than the free limit. Browser extensions and phone apps make new aliases in one click.

Apple Hide My Email

Included with an iCloud+ subscription. When Safari or an app asks for your email, you can tap Hide My Email to create a random @icloud.com address that forwards to you. Sign in with Apple uses a similar @privaterelay.appleid.com address. You can deactivate, reactivate, or delete addresses in Settings, under your name, iCloud, Hide My Email. Apple says forwarded messages are deleted from its relay servers after delivery, usually within seconds.

Firefox Relay

Made by Mozilla. The free plan gives you 5 email masks and removes many email trackers. Paid plans add unlimited masks and, in some countries, a phone number mask for texts and calls. Mozilla has offered paid plans by waitlist in some places, so check availability before you plan around it.

Where aliases fall short

• You depend on the service. If the alias company shut down or you lost access, mail to those aliases would stop. Keep your bank, government, and health accounts on an address you control for the long term.
• Some sites block alias domains. A few services refuse sign-ups from well-known alias addresses.
• Replies can get confusing. Replying from the alias works, but you need to use the service’s reply feature, not your normal “From” address.
• They don’t stop phishing. A scam email can still reach you through an alias. The upside: if a store’s alias suddenly gets a “bank” email, you know it is fake.

How to use an email alias

1. Pick one service. iCloud+ subscribers can use Hide My Email. Everyone else can start with SimpleLogin’s free plan.
2. Install the browser extension or app so you can create an alias right on the sign-up form.
3. Create a new alias for each store, app, or newsletter. Name it after the site so you remember where it came from.
4. Read mail normally. It arrives in your usual inbox.
5. Switch off any alias that starts getting spam or turns up in a breach notice. Nothing else is affected.

Tips for families and older adults

• Aliases are a quiet scam filter. If an alias you gave only to a pet store gets a message claiming to be from the IRS, it is fake.
• Save each alias in your password manager next to that site’s login, so you know which address you used.
• After a breach notice, an alias makes the cleanup simple. See What to Do After a Data Breach.

FAQ

Is using an email alias legal and allowed?

Yes. It is your address, and it forwards to you. Some sites may reject alias domains, but using one is not against the law.

Can I reply to someone from an alias?

SimpleLogin and Hide My Email support replying through the alias so your real address stays hidden.

What is the difference between an alias and a second email account?

An alias has no inbox of its own. It forwards to your existing inbox, so you only check one place.

Sources

• SimpleLogin, “Pricing,” simplelogin.io/pricing, accessed October 6, 2026.
• Apple Support, “How to use Hide My Email with iCloud+ on your iPhone or iPad,” support.apple.com, accessed October 6, 2026.
• Mozilla, “Firefox Relay Premium,” relay.firefox.com/premium, and “Firefox Relay – Email and Phone masks,” support.mozilla.org, accessed October 6, 2026.

Photo: cottonbro studio via Pexels. Pexels License.

This review is general information, not legal advice. Plans and prices change, so check each service’s own page before you sign up.