But according to Google Workspace Support on Twitter "there’s no connection between Google Workspace Essentials Starter and the G Suite legacy free edition, it is therefore, not a transition option.”*
Does this make sense to anyone? Why not allow former legacy users to migrate to this new free plan?
Correct. But Gmail is the only service missing from the Workspace Essentials Starter whereas if you don't update your G Suite legacy subscription to a paid plan you won't be able to access your Google Workspace *core services* and *data*, including *Gmail*, *Calendar*, *Drive*, and *Meet*.
It doesn't address the criticism from many legacy Google Apps users using custom domain email and drive / calendar for our families.
It would be great if they would at least provide a reasonably priced option. I don't mind paying, but paying $7/mo per account just seems like they're ignoring personal use rather than business use.
I'd be willing to pay $10 or $15/mo for up to 10 personal accounts.
I have been using it for 13 years and my account during all these years had only 1 user and I never used more than 13GB of the data. But since I'm using this email address for 13 years make paying my only option even if it ends up being paying another company.
What is illogical to me is why not offer the same Workspace Essentials Starter Google (without Gmail) is offering to anyone with a custom domain email right now as a downgrade option to legacy users. That's better than not having any data available, no Drive etc.
Not including custom email domains makes this feel like giving with one hand and taking with the other. Not interested in video chat, document editing et al, only interested in the email aspect of it. This could literally be appended to a free Gmail account for all I care.
If you have bought a custom domain just to use with Google Apps and then created and email that you've been using for 13 years changing your email address is just not an option. So, you basically have to pay either Google or another provider.
What makes no sense to me is why Google isn't offering former legacy users the option to to migrate to the newly announced Workspace Essentials Starter while making it available to anyone with a custom email right now.
It is not even clear if you move all of your data out of Google and then delete your Google account entirely it would be allowed for you to create an Essentials Starter account with the exact same domain you just deleted.
There's free custom domain email options elsewhere, including Yandex (free up to 1,000 accounts), which I will use as an External Account via a free Gmail account. It is infuriating to need to go through all the hassle of mucking about with DNS and configs in Docker containers across a dozen domains. Why not just let me use it with a free Gmail account directly? Lol.
Does this make sense to anyone? Why not allow former legacy users to migrate to this new free plan?
* https://mobile.twitter.com/AskWorkspace/status/1489469620985...