How to create a FREE business email address

If you want your business to look authentic and trustworthy, you’re going to need to get a proper business email address – that means no @hotmail or @gmail handles that could put a potential customer off. But can you do this for free?

The answer is something of a “Yes, but…” and that’s worth expanding on. While you technically can get a free business email address, with your brand name right there after the @ sign, you are going to have to spend at some stage on something else – most typically, purchasing the domain or paying for a hosting provider, who will then throw in the email address for free. It’s a little like saying you can get a free napkin from Pret, provided you’re willing to buy a sandwich first.

That said, thanks to some generous free trial periods – hosting providers often give you the first year for free, you can get quite a long way without having to spend anything.

So how do you go about getting a free email address? Below, we’ll take you through how to create a business email for free in 5 easy steps. We’ll explain every fiddly task including registering a domain name, choosing an email service provider, and setting up multiple users. We’ll also give you recommendations to the best email hosting platforms. Based on our first-hand user testing, our favourite is Bluehost because of its wealthy range of features, generous storage allowance, and flexible pricing plans.

1. Register a free domain name

Register a domain for your business email with Bluehost today

Bluehost is our top provider for domain and hosting services, and it offers great first term discounts for new customers.

Try Bluehost It only takes a minute.

One of the first steps when getting a business email is to register a domain name.

Your domain name is the address of your website, and forms the foundation of your business email. For that reason it should include your business name, or be as close to your business name as possible.

Based on our user testing, the easiest way to register a domain name is to use an internet domain registrar or web hosting company, such as Bluehost (our top-ranked hosting provider for small businesses), or InMotion hosting, our second best.

We’ve picked out our top-rated providers in the chart below:

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Overall score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.6	Overall score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.5	Overall score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.5	Overall score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.1	Overall score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.0
Best Overall hosting provider	Best For shared and VPS hosting	Best For Up Time Performance	Best Energy efficiency	Best For customer service
Cost Starting from £2.33 per month	Cost $9.49 $2.99/mo*	Cost $11.95 per month	Cost From £1.99 per month	Cost $1.59 – 2.59 per month
Visit Try Bluehost	Visit Try InMotion	Visit Try HostGator	Visit Visit SiteGround	Visit Try A2 Hosting

If you sign up for a hosting plan with either of the above hosting providers, you get a free domain name for the first year, with many web hosting companies offering free or discounted business email in the cost of their plans as well.

To get started, just select a hosting plan. You can choose either shared, VPS, or dedicated hosting (check out our guide on website hosting for more information).

Now you’re ready to choose and register your domain name. If you choose one that’s already been taken, the registrar will show you alternatives that are closely related (i.e with different spellings or extensions). If it’s available, congratulations – you’ve taken the first successful step towards setting up your business email.

Next, you’ll have to fill in all your personal and payment information in order to create your account.

If you choose BlueHost’s cheapest paid-for plan, BlueHost Sharing, you’ll pay a total of £44 per month. This is excluding any optional paid extras such as domain privacy + protection, which prevents your personal contact information from being publicly available, and SiteLock Security.

We’d recommend privacy + protection if you want to avoid being harassed, or don’t want to risk your domain being transferred. You can decide whether or not you want any of the other optional extras at a later date.

2. Choose an email provider

This may be decided for you. Many hosting providers work with an email partner, which will allow you to access free or discounted email services through your hosting plan.

One of your options will be to use Google Workspace, which in effect gives you all the look and feel of a personal Gmail account, but with the professional touch of your own business domain after the @ sign, plus extra features for business users including more storage and the ability to host more people on work video calls.

Take a look at our table below for more on Google Workspace’s pricing plans:

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CHEAPEST PLAN
Business Starter	Business Standard	Business Plus	Enterprise
Cost £5 per user, per month for a one-year commitment	Cost £10 per user, per month for a one-year commitment	Cost £15 per user, per month for a one-year commitment	Cost Contact sales
Features Custom and secure business email 100-participant video meetings 30GB storage per user Security and management controls	Features Custom and secure business email 150-participant video meetings and recording 2TB of storage per user Security and management controls	Features Ediscovery and retention 500 participant video meetings and attendance tracking 5TB storage per user Advanced endpoint management	Features S/MIME encryption As much storage as needed Advanced security, management and compliance controls Noise cancellation and in-domain live streaming

Get a professional business email address and hosting Compare Costs

Not sold on Gmail? Bluehost also offers one Microsoft 365 (Outlook) mailbox 30-day free trial with every hosting plan. One mailbox equates to one user. After the trial ends, you’ll have to upgrade to one of its three email plans, which all have reasonable starting prices:

• Email Essentials – £3.67 per license per month
• Business Plus – £7.34 per license per month
• Business Pro – £11 per license per month

With HostGator, you can choose to add either Microsoft Outlook or Google Workspace (Gmail) at checkout for £4.32 per month. Choose whichever best suits your needs.

Both Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 offer new advanced AI features for business users, too. Take a look at our guide to Google Duet vs Microsoft Copilot for more. 

3. Create your email address

Great stuff – you’ve registered your domain name with a respectable hosting provider, and you’ve chosen your email provider. Now you’re ready to create your very own business email address. 

All you have to do is:

1. Log into your hosting account
2. Click on the ‘Email’ section
3. Click ‘Create’
4. Fill in the appropriate box with the business email and extension you’ve decided on (e.g. henry@coolfunkybusiness.com – in Bluehost this is under ‘Username’, while in Hostgator, it’s under ‘Email’)
5. Create a password using the password generator
6. Select whether you want a maximum storage limit or unlimited storage (you get unlimited storage on all plans with HostGator, so you might as well use it)
7. Click ‘Save’ or ‘Create Account’, and…
8. Hey presto! You’ve just set up your first free business email account
9. Check your email for a confirmation email

4. Access your new email account

Now you need to access your webmail to make sure you can send and receive emails.

You can pick any webmail application you like, just follow the instructions in the webmail section of your hosting provider. 

This is also where you approve which devices you want to be able to access your email from.

5. Set up multiple users

You can then repeat the above process to create more users (any personalised email address) using the same business email extension.

Once you upgrade to a paid plan, you’ll have pay for each additional user at the same rate as your plan.

For example, if you opt for Google Workspace’s Business Standard plan (£8.28 per user per month) and have three users, you’ll pay £24.84 per month.

Group email aliases – such as sales@coolfunkybusiness.com or info@coolfunkybusiness.com – don’t count as additional users and so are included in the cost of your plan.

Final thoughts

If you’re setting up a business website, we’d recommend setting up your business email through your hosting provider. It makes everything a lot easier, and means you can manage everything from one place.

There are other hosting providers to choose from, and other email services, but we think Bluehost and HostGator are great options for most small businesses. If you choose any Bluehost hosting plan, you can use Microsoft 365 and Outlook completely free for 30 days, with prices starting from £2.15 per month thereafter for five business emails.

HostGator’s pricing plans start from £2.20 per month (billed annually) for either Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace.

What’s the next step?

Your first business email is now sorted. So what’s next?

Here’s what else you need to consider to get your business properly up and running:

• Build a website with a small business website builder
• Open a small business account
• Design a business plan using project management software

Set up a business email with Bluehost today

Bluehost is our top provider for domain and hosting services, and it offers great first term discounts for new customers.

Try Bluehost It only takes a minute.