Change your primary email address and set delivery for your email addresses

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Before you begin

Faculty, staff, affiliates, and currently enrolled students can make changes to their primary IU email address and email delivery as described below. Those without an active status (for example, admitted or former students, former employees) cannot. If you do not have an active status, see Continue using your IU-branded email address.

Important:
If your account already has a primary IU email address, and you need to change it (for example, from username@indiana.edu to username@iu.edu), to avoid problems with mailing list subscriptions, website logins, and access to services both inside and outside of IU, you'll need to take several additional steps; see Avoid service interruptions when changing the primary email address for a personal or group computing account at IU.

Your primary IU email address

In some cases, an IU username will have more than one IU email address associated with it. Every account now has an @iu.edu suffix; see Your IU email address. Additionally, you may have, or can choose to create, a campus-specific address. Whichever you choose to be your primary email address is what appears in the IU Directory and the Global Address List. However, either address will deliver mail to your account.

Note:
If you have not yet created your first IU computing accounts, or are a returning IU student with only an Active Directory account, going through the Starter Kit will, in most cases, automatically set your primary IU email address, based on your data from the Office of the Registrar (students), the Office of Academic Affairs (faculty), or IU Human Resources (staff). For instructions, see Create your first IU computing accounts (admitted students, faculty, staff, affiliates, and those returning to IU). If you have recently run the Starter Kit, you will need to wait at least 24 hours before making further changes.

Delivery of your mail

Mail addressed to your IU email address(es) is delivered to the email service of your choice via the IU mail servers. In simple terms, think of setting email address delivery as placing a forwarding rule on your IU email address(es) (that is, telling the IU mail system where to deliver messages sent to your @indiana.edu or @iupui.edu email address).

In some cases, you may be permitted to choose an existing account on a non-IU email service (for example, Yahoo! or a personal Gmail account) as your preferred email service.

Important:

Before setting your IU email address to forward to a non-IU service (for example, personal Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo!), note:

  • UITS cannot guarantee email delivery to non-IU accounts, delays in delivery can occur, and the UITS Support Center may not be able to help with some problems concerning non-IU accounts. If your email forwarding fails for any reason, you may miss important official communications sent to your IU address for which you are still responsible. For more, see If you forward your IU email address and aren't receiving external email messages.
  • Faculty, staff, residents, and students in HIPAA Affected Areas whose roles may require sharing protected health information (PHI) via email (such as the Schools of Medicine, Dentistry, or Optometry) are not permitted to set up mail forwarding to outside accounts, as this could result in the violation of federal and state laws. You are permitted to forward your IU email to your IU Health (username@iuhealth.org) email account. For more, see HIPAA Privacy and Security Compliance.

If you wish to deliver your email to a non-IU email service and are permitted to do so, for more reliable delivery, UITS recommends first setting delivery to an IU email service (using the instructions below), and then using the forwarding mechanism of that email service to forward email to your non-IU address. For example, for Exchange accounts, follow the directions in Forward your IU email to another address using Microsoft Outlook or Outlook on the web.

Make selections

Note:
For departmental, student organization, or group accounts, you can change the passphrase if you know the current one. Other account settings must be handled by the account owner.

Your primary IU email address

  1. Individual accounts:

    Go to Manage Your Email.

    Group accounts:

    In a fresh browser in which you have not logged into IU Login, navigate to Manage Your Email. Log in using your group account credentials.

  2. Click Set your primary e-mail address. Next to "Set primary e-mail address to:", from the drop-down menu, select a primary IU email address. (If you are or have been affiliated with more than one IU campus, you may see more than one email address listed.)
    Important:
    If your account already has a primary IU email address, and you need to change it (for example, from username@indiana.edu to username@iu.edu), to avoid problems with mailing list subscriptions, website logins, and access to services both inside and outside of IU, you'll need to take several additional steps; see Avoid service interruptions when changing the primary email address for a personal or group computing account at IU.

Your email address delivery

  1. Individual accounts:

    Go to Manage Your Email.

    Group accounts:

    In a fresh browser in which you have not logged into IU Login, navigate to Manage Your Email. Log in using your group account credentials.

  2. Select Forward email, and then choose the appropriate option for your email address(es):

    To select a different IU email service, choose Set delivery for the address(es) to the IU email service:, and select the appropriate email service.

    To use a non-IU email service for your preferred email service, choose Set the delivery for the address(es) to:, and then enter the address to which you'd like your IU email forwarded.

  3. Click Continue.
  4. A pop-up will display an important message about your responsibility for all university communications and Exchange user functionality; click Forward to proceed with changing your settings. You will receive a message indicating your email settings were saved.

Changes may take up to 30 minutes to take effect.

Related documents

Request a username change for your UITS computing accounts

This is document berh in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2022-12-13 13:34:38.