{"slug": "hide-my-email", "name": "Hide My Email", "category": "communication", "category_name": "Email and chat", "description": "Apple iCloud+ feature that creates unique, random email aliases that forward to your real inbox.", "recommenders": 8, "commenters": 15, "warners": 3, "score": 5.79, "rising": 4.02, "first": "2026-04-27", "latest": "2026-10-19", "why": "HN commenters like it for giving each service its own unique alias, for aliases on the regular iCloud domain that are harder to block than other relays, and for being cheap with iCloud+.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 8, "neutral": 5, "compare": 0, "warn": 3}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 5, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Per-service aliases", "Everyday reliability"], "caveat": "Apple lock-in", "short_quote": "I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out.", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.apple.com/icloud/", "pricing": "paid", "aliases": ["Hide My Email", "iCloud Hide My Email"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like it for giving each service its own unique alias", "cites": [{"id": 802387824, "item_id": 50149239, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50149239", "by": "daem", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I've been trying to update my Forward To address for months on multiple versions of macOS and iOS, and it doesn't work.", "excerpt": "I also used Hide My Email to de-Google. I changed the email on basically every online service I use from my Gmail to a unique Hide My Email address for each service. At one point, when I had fewer Hide My Email addresses, I was able to change my Forward To address. But now when I try to change it, it simply doesn't work. I see the same screen as in your screenshot, but selecting a different Forward To address and sub", "context": "de-Googling", "use_case": "unique email aliases per service", "switched_from": "Gmail", "story": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL"}, {"id": 776979104, "item_id": 48561194, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48561194", "by": "Razengan", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out.", "excerpt": "Oh fuck. I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out. It's actually useful compared to Gmail's useless \"yourrealaddress+alais\" that gives away your actual email anyway, and it helped me catch quite a few spammers/data sellers. Hide My Email addresses already have a peculiar format that others could guess, and some do block those, and there's no reason to add a blatant \"priv", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases against spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 786843888, "item_id": 49177743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49177743", "by": "rickstanley", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I pay mainly for Hide My Email, just to organise things per domain, and it's cheap.", "excerpt": "When I go to https://leaks.psylo.app on \"Possible IP leaks\" side I see only \"WebAuthn\" with my real IP and, occasionally, WebTransport with an incorrect IP. For \"HTTPS Traffic\" it always show some other relay. Using Safari 26.5 I'm not sure what would I use WebAuthn for, if ever, maybe I could disable it through \"Feature Flags\" menu?; regardless, I never treat Apple's services as \"premium\", since the email fingerprin", "context": "", "use_case": "per-domain email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay"}]}, {"text": ", for aliases on the regular iCloud domain that are harder to block than other relays", "cites": [{"id": 790852608, "item_id": 49428288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428288", "by": "kqp", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is a huge selling point.", "excerpt": "This is a huge selling point. Private email relays often get blocked, the only lasting solution is to put them on the same domain as, and in the same format as, a significant number of non-private email addresses. As far as I\u2019m aware the only other provider doing this is Fastmail. Comments about lock-in aren\u2019t wrong, but it has to be this way. You can make arbitrary email addresses at your own domain, but anybody who", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852288, "item_id": 49428268, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428268", "by": "wijayaerick", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy", "excerpt": "iCloud Hide My Email sharing the same domain with normal email (icloud.com) is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}]}, {"text": ", and for being cheap with iCloud+.", "cites": [{"id": 786843888, "item_id": 49177743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49177743", "by": "rickstanley", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I pay mainly for Hide My Email, just to organise things per domain, and it's cheap.", "excerpt": "When I go to https://leaks.psylo.app on \"Possible IP leaks\" side I see only \"WebAuthn\" with my real IP and, occasionally, WebTransport with an incorrect IP. For \"HTTPS Traffic\" it always show some other relay. Using Safari 26.5 I'm not sure what would I use WebAuthn for, if ever, maybe I could disable it through \"Feature Flags\" menu?; regardless, I never treat Apple's services as \"premium\", since the email fingerprin", "context": "", "use_case": "per-domain email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay"}, {"id": 775068193, "item_id": 48441762, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48441762", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good", "excerpt": "I recommend people use proper email aliasing, not plus addressing. Duckduckgo makes a free one that's can integrate into Bitwarden, if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good. Addy.io and SimpleLogin are the best and allow PGP encryption to prevent another party having access to your emails, but they are paid for full features. > Organizations like the IAB require that advertisers normalize email ", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "1k Data Breaches Later, the Disclosure Lag Is Worse"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaints are Apple lock-in", "cites": [{"id": 790857776, "item_id": 49428611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428611", "by": "DarmokTanagra", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system", "excerpt": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system combined with some basic email forwarding rules. Yes, vendor lock in sucks, but I have $20k worth of apple hardware already so that ship has sailed and overall Im pretty happy with it.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852608, "item_id": 49428288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428288", "by": "kqp", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is a huge selling point.", "excerpt": "This is a huge selling point. Private email relays often get blocked, the only lasting solution is to put them on the same domain as, and in the same format as, a significant number of non-private email addresses. As far as I\u2019m aware the only other provider doing this is Fastmail. Comments about lock-in aren\u2019t wrong, but it has to be this way. You can make arbitrary email addresses at your own domain, but anybody who", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}]}, {"text": " and clunky alias management, with unreliable autofill prompts and one report of a Forward To setting that silently fails to change.", "cites": [{"id": 777154240, "item_id": 48572140, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48572140", "by": "port11", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields.", "excerpt": "I pay for the bundle, but HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields. Most of the time I never get the prompt from HME. It\u2019s also might obnoxious if you ever need to remove an email from that list (or, gods forbid, mass clean the list). But okay, this update is even worse. I might just stop paying for the iCloud+ whatchamacallit and backup to my Mac like I used to.", "context": "pays for iCloud+ bundle", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 774438192, "item_id": 48402387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48402387", "by": "halapro", "date": "2026-06-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time", "excerpt": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time and the unsubscribe button is always there. It's not the most polished interface, but it works perfectly. Also, for any subscription for which I don't use HME, I will immediately \"mark as spam\" any minimally-spammy email I get. The ones described in the article would be insta-marked due to the lack of Unsubscribe button.", "context": "", "use_case": "avoiding subscription spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "The desperation of NYTimes"}, {"id": 802387824, "item_id": 50149239, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50149239", "by": "daem", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I've been trying to update my Forward To address for months on multiple versions of macOS and iOS, and it doesn't work.", "excerpt": "I also used Hide My Email to de-Google. I changed the email on basically every online service I use from my Gmail to a unique Hide My Email address for each service. At one point, when I had fewer Hide My Email addresses, I was able to change my Forward To address. But now when I try to change it, it simply doesn't work. I see the same screen as in your screenshot, but selecting a different Forward To address and sub", "context": "de-Googling", "use_case": "unique email aliases per service", "switched_from": "Gmail", "story": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Per-service aliases", "summary": "Users give each service a unique address, which helps them organize accounts and catch spammers or data sellers.", "quotes": [{"id": 802387824, "item_id": 50149239, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50149239", "by": "daem", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I've been trying to update my Forward To address for months on multiple versions of macOS and iOS, and it doesn't work.", "excerpt": "I also used Hide My Email to de-Google. I changed the email on basically every online service I use from my Gmail to a unique Hide My Email address for each service. At one point, when I had fewer Hide My Email addresses, I was able to change my Forward To address. But now when I try to change it, it simply doesn't work. I see the same screen as in your screenshot, but selecting a different Forward To address and sub", "context": "de-Googling", "use_case": "unique email aliases per service", "switched_from": "Gmail", "story": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL"}, {"id": 776979104, "item_id": 48561194, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48561194", "by": "Razengan", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out.", "excerpt": "Oh fuck. I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out. It's actually useful compared to Gmail's useless \"yourrealaddress+alais\" that gives away your actual email anyway, and it helped me catch quite a few spammers/data sellers. Hide My Email addresses already have a peculiar format that others could guess, and some do block those, and there's no reason to add a blatant \"priv", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases against spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 786843888, "item_id": 49177743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49177743", "by": "rickstanley", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I pay mainly for Hide My Email, just to organise things per domain, and it's cheap.", "excerpt": "When I go to https://leaks.psylo.app on \"Possible IP leaks\" side I see only \"WebAuthn\" with my real IP and, occasionally, WebTransport with an incorrect IP. For \"HTTPS Traffic\" it always show some other relay. Using Safari 26.5 I'm not sure what would I use WebAuthn for, if ever, maybe I could disable it through \"Feature Flags\" menu?; regardless, I never treat Apple's services as \"premium\", since the email fingerprin", "context": "", "use_case": "per-domain email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay"}]}, {"label": "Everyday reliability", "summary": "Several commenters say they use it constantly and that it works well.", "quotes": [{"id": 774438192, "item_id": 48402387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48402387", "by": "halapro", "date": "2026-06-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time", "excerpt": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time and the unsubscribe button is always there. It's not the most polished interface, but it works perfectly. Also, for any subscription for which I don't use HME, I will immediately \"mark as spam\" any minimally-spammy email I get. The ones described in the article would be insta-marked due to the lack of Unsubscribe button.", "context": "", "use_case": "avoiding subscription spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "The desperation of NYTimes"}, {"id": 790857776, "item_id": 49428611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428611", "by": "DarmokTanagra", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system", "excerpt": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system combined with some basic email forwarding rules. Yes, vendor lock in sucks, but I have $20k worth of apple hardware already so that ship has sailed and overall Im pretty happy with it.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790827312, "item_id": 49426707, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49426707", "by": "joshuat", "date": "2026-08-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use this feature extensively and would like to continue to", "excerpt": "I'm glad they listened - I use this feature extensively and would like to continue to", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}]}, {"label": "Shared iCloud domain", "summary": "Aliases share icloud.com with normal addresses, so commenters say they are harder to detect and block than SimpleLogin or addy aliases.", "quotes": [{"id": 790852608, "item_id": 49428288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428288", "by": "kqp", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is a huge selling point.", "excerpt": "This is a huge selling point. Private email relays often get blocked, the only lasting solution is to put them on the same domain as, and in the same format as, a significant number of non-private email addresses. As far as I\u2019m aware the only other provider doing this is Fastmail. Comments about lock-in aren\u2019t wrong, but it has to be this way. You can make arbitrary email addresses at your own domain, but anybody who", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852288, "item_id": 49428268, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428268", "by": "wijayaerick", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy", "excerpt": "iCloud Hide My Email sharing the same domain with normal email (icloud.com) is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}]}, {"label": "Usable outside Apple", "summary": "Some generate aliases on icloud.com or through a Chrome extension and save them in 1Password or Firefox.", "quotes": [{"id": 777006064, "item_id": 48562879, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48562879", "by": "Marsymars", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Hide My Email largely without integration to the Apple ecosystem", "excerpt": "Does it? I use Hide My Email largely without integration to the Apple ecosystem - I generate new emails on icloud.com and copy/paste them to login forms before saving to 1Password.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777011808, "item_id": 48563238, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48563238", "by": "KomoD", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Hide My Email is pretty much the only Apple service I use", "excerpt": "Same, Hide My Email is pretty much the only Apple service I use and the aliases are only for accounts I don't really care about. I use this wonderful extension to make it easy to generate aliases https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/icloud-hide-my-email/omiaekblhgfopjkjnenhahfgcgnbohlk", "context": "", "use_case": "aliases for unimportant accounts", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777141905, "item_id": 48571369, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48571369", "by": "lunatuna", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My workflow is to use Passwords and Hide my on safari", "excerpt": "It isn\u2019t that straight forward but I use Firefox on Linux along with my iPhone and Mac. My workflow is to use Passwords and Hide my on safari and then Firefox there after on the Apple device. Firefox then saves the login details and it shows up on my Linux + Firefox desktop. Not ideal, kinda dumb, and takes away a little bit of faith in humanity, but I don\u2019t have to type in the details.", "context": "Linux, iPhone and Mac user", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}]}, {"label": "Low cost", "summary": "Commenters describe it as cheap with an iCloud+ subscription, at about $0.99/month.", "quotes": [{"id": 786843888, "item_id": 49177743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49177743", "by": "rickstanley", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I pay mainly for Hide My Email, just to organise things per domain, and it's cheap.", "excerpt": "When I go to https://leaks.psylo.app on \"Possible IP leaks\" side I see only \"WebAuthn\" with my real IP and, occasionally, WebTransport with an incorrect IP. For \"HTTPS Traffic\" it always show some other relay. Using Safari 26.5 I'm not sure what would I use WebAuthn for, if ever, maybe I could disable it through \"Feature Flags\" menu?; regardless, I never treat Apple's services as \"premium\", since the email fingerprin", "context": "", "use_case": "per-domain email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay"}, {"id": 775068193, "item_id": 48441762, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48441762", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good", "excerpt": "I recommend people use proper email aliasing, not plus addressing. Duckduckgo makes a free one that's can integrate into Bitwarden, if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good. Addy.io and SimpleLogin are the best and allow PGP encryption to prevent another party having access to your emails, but they are paid for full features. > Organizations like the IAB require that advertisers normalize email ", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "1k Data Breaches Later, the Disclosure Lag Is Worse"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Apple lock-in", "summary": "Commenters say the aliases tie you to Apple, though some accept this as the price of a shared domain.", "quotes": [{"id": 790857776, "item_id": 49428611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428611", "by": "DarmokTanagra", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system", "excerpt": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system combined with some basic email forwarding rules. Yes, vendor lock in sucks, but I have $20k worth of apple hardware already so that ship has sailed and overall Im pretty happy with it.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852608, "item_id": 49428288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428288", "by": "kqp", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is a huge selling point.", "excerpt": "This is a huge selling point. Private email relays often get blocked, the only lasting solution is to put them on the same domain as, and in the same format as, a significant number of non-private email addresses. As far as I\u2019m aware the only other provider doing this is Fastmail. Comments about lock-in aren\u2019t wrong, but it has to be this way. You can make arbitrary email addresses at your own domain, but anybody who", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}]}, {"label": "Clunky management", "summary": "Removing or bulk-cleaning aliases is described as obnoxious, and the interface as not polished.", "quotes": [{"id": 777154240, "item_id": 48572140, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48572140", "by": "port11", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields.", "excerpt": "I pay for the bundle, but HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields. Most of the time I never get the prompt from HME. It\u2019s also might obnoxious if you ever need to remove an email from that list (or, gods forbid, mass clean the list). But okay, this update is even worse. I might just stop paying for the iCloud+ whatchamacallit and backup to my Mac like I used to.", "context": "pays for iCloud+ bundle", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 774438192, "item_id": 48402387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48402387", "by": "halapro", "date": "2026-06-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time", "excerpt": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time and the unsubscribe button is always there. It's not the most polished interface, but it works perfectly. Also, for any subscription for which I don't use HME, I will immediately \"mark as spam\" any minimally-spammy email I get. The ones described in the article would be insta-marked due to the lack of Unsubscribe button.", "context": "", "use_case": "avoiding subscription spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "The desperation of NYTimes"}]}, {"label": "Unreliable autofill", "summary": "One paying user says the alias prompt appears on only about 40% of form fields.", "quotes": [{"id": 777154240, "item_id": 48572140, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48572140", "by": "port11", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields.", "excerpt": "I pay for the bundle, but HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields. Most of the time I never get the prompt from HME. It\u2019s also might obnoxious if you ever need to remove an email from that list (or, gods forbid, mass clean the list). But okay, this update is even worse. I might just stop paying for the iCloud+ whatchamacallit and backup to my Mac like I used to.", "context": "pays for iCloud+ bundle", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}]}, {"label": "Forward To bug", "summary": "One user with many aliases says changing the Forward To address has silently failed for months on macOS and iOS.", "quotes": [{"id": 802387824, "item_id": 50149239, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50149239", "by": "daem", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I've been trying to update my Forward To address for months on multiple versions of macOS and iOS, and it doesn't work.", "excerpt": "I also used Hide My Email to de-Google. I changed the email on basically every online service I use from my Gmail to a unique Hide My Email address for each service. At one point, when I had fewer Hide My Email addresses, I was able to change my Forward To address. But now when I try to change it, it simply doesn't work. I see the same screen as in your screenshot, but selecting a different Forward To address and sub", "context": "de-Googling", "use_case": "unique email aliases per service", "switched_from": "Gmail", "story": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL"}]}, {"label": "Address format changes", "summary": "Commenters objected to an update adding a 'private.' tag to alias addresses, saying it makes them easier to identify and block.", "quotes": [{"id": 776979104, "item_id": 48561194, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48561194", "by": "Razengan", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out.", "excerpt": "Oh fuck. I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out. It's actually useful compared to Gmail's useless \"yourrealaddress+alais\" that gives away your actual email anyway, and it helped me catch quite a few spammers/data sellers. Hide My Email addresses already have a peculiar format that others could guess, and some do block those, and there's no reason to add a blatant \"priv", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases against spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777154240, "item_id": 48572140, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48572140", "by": "port11", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields.", "excerpt": "I pay for the bundle, but HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields. Most of the time I never get the prompt from HME. It\u2019s also might obnoxious if you ever need to remove an email from that list (or, gods forbid, mass clean the list). But okay, this update is even worse. I might just stop paying for the iCloud+ whatchamacallit and backup to my Mac like I used to.", "context": "pays for iCloud+ bundle", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}]}, {"label": "Requires iCloud+", "summary": "The feature is only available with a paid iCloud+ subscription.", "quotes": [{"id": 775068193, "item_id": 48441762, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48441762", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good", "excerpt": "I recommend people use proper email aliasing, not plus addressing. Duckduckgo makes a free one that's can integrate into Bitwarden, if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good. Addy.io and SimpleLogin are the best and allow PGP encryption to prevent another party having access to your emails, but they are paid for full features. > Organizations like the IAB require that advertisers normalize email ", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "1k Data Breaches Later, the Disclosure Lag Is Worse"}, {"id": 766827731, "item_id": 47926733, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47926733", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-04-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "If you have iCloud+ Apple has an email aliasing service called Hidemyemail.", "excerpt": "I recommend anyone to use email aliasing and perhaps the Mullvad browser (if every fucking website using browser fingerprinting is getting a little tiring). These companies are just trying to suck up as much data as possible and ruin the web. Email aliasing prevents spam or linking of your emails by giving you a seperate email address to give to each service. When that service inevitably leaks your data, the leaked a", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "You have to have an account to read IMDB reviews now"}]}], "who": [{"by": "lunatuna", "context": "Linux, iPhone and Mac user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48571369", "date": "2026-06-17"}], "tags": ["for Apple users", "for de-Googling", "for spam control", "works with password managers"], "use_cases": ["email aliasing", "email aliases", "unique email aliases per service", "per-domain email aliases", "disposable email aliases", "email privacy"], "compared": [{"slug": "gmail", "name": "Gmail", "co": 1, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "simplelogin", "name": "SimpleLogin", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "fastmail", "name": "Fastmail", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "duckduckgo-email-protection", "name": "DuckDuckGo Email Protection", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "addy-io", "name": "addy.io", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48559935", "title": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless", "mentions": 6}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49426564", "title": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50141909", "title": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49176697", "title": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49063022", "title": "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744606", "title": "Apple 'Hide My Email' Vulnerability Reveals Peoples' Real Email Addresses", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 3, "warn": 1}, "2026-07": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 5}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802387824, "item_id": 50149239, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50149239", "by": "daem", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I've been trying to update my Forward To address for months on multiple versions of macOS and iOS, and it doesn't work.", "excerpt": "I also used Hide My Email to de-Google. I changed the email on basically every online service I use from my Gmail to a unique Hide My Email address for each service. At one point, when I had fewer Hide My Email addresses, I was able to change my Forward To address. But now when I try to change it, it simply doesn't work. I see the same screen as in your screenshot, but selecting a different Forward To address and sub", "context": "de-Googling", "use_case": "unique email aliases per service", "switched_from": "Gmail", "story": "macOS 15.8.2 Breaks OpenGL"}, {"id": 790857776, "item_id": 49428611, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428611", "by": "DarmokTanagra", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system", "excerpt": "I use hide my email and single use credit card numbers all the time, its a fantastic system combined with some basic email forwarding rules. Yes, vendor lock in sucks, but I have $20k worth of apple hardware already so that ship has sailed and overall Im pretty happy with it.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852608, "item_id": 49428288, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428288", "by": "kqp", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is a huge selling point.", "excerpt": "This is a huge selling point. Private email relays often get blocked, the only lasting solution is to put them on the same domain as, and in the same format as, a significant number of non-private email addresses. As far as I\u2019m aware the only other provider doing this is Fastmail. Comments about lock-in aren\u2019t wrong, but it has to be this way. You can make arbitrary email addresses at your own domain, but anybody who", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790852288, "item_id": 49428268, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49428268", "by": "wijayaerick", "date": "2026-08-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy", "excerpt": "iCloud Hide My Email sharing the same domain with normal email (icloud.com) is the reason why I use iCloud over other email alias services like simplelogin and addy.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 790827312, "item_id": 49426707, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49426707", "by": "joshuat", "date": "2026-08-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I use this feature extensively and would like to continue to", "excerpt": "I'm glad they listened - I use this feature extensively and would like to continue to", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "iCloud+ Hide My Email addresses will remain on icloud.com"}, {"id": 786843888, "item_id": 49177743, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49177743", "by": "rickstanley", "date": "2026-08-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I pay mainly for Hide My Email, just to organise things per domain, and it's cheap.", "excerpt": "When I go to https://leaks.psylo.app on \"Possible IP leaks\" side I see only \"WebAuthn\" with my real IP and, occasionally, WebTransport with an incorrect IP. For \"HTTPS Traffic\" it always show some other relay. Using Safari 26.5 I'm not sure what would I use WebAuthn for, if ever, maybe I could disable it through \"Feature Flags\" menu?; regardless, I never treat Apple's services as \"premium\", since the email fingerprin", "context": "", "use_case": "per-domain email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "IP and DNS Leaks in WebKit Affecting Proxy Browsers and iCloud Private Relay"}, {"id": 785428881, "item_id": 49089305, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49089305", "by": "salad-tycoon", "date": "2026-07-28", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use disposable emails via simplelogin (?) and iCloud hide my email.", "excerpt": "Or like me, I use disposable emails via simplelogin (?) and iCloud hide my email. I have hundreds. \u201cRoflz\u201d but I\u2019m a citizen so guess I\u2019m okay?", "context": "", "use_case": "disposable email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "US citizen charged after GrapheneOS phone wipes during airport search"}, {"id": 780018208, "item_id": 48751138, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48751138", "by": "kittikitti", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I use this feature often and I'm very disappointed.", "excerpt": "I use this feature often and I'm very disappointed. Depending on the exploit, I'm awaiting to join a class action lawsuit. I'm constantly humiliated by believing Big Tech's security promises and I've had enough. I suspect that this is yet another intentional backdoor. When these security systems fail, people like me experience violence.", "context": "", "use_case": "email privacy", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple 'Hide My Email' Vulnerability Reveals Peoples' Real Email Addresses"}, {"id": 777154240, "item_id": 48572140, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48572140", "by": "port11", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "warn", "quote": "HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields.", "excerpt": "I pay for the bundle, but HME was never hassle-free. I would say that it works on ~40% of form fields. Most of the time I never get the prompt from HME. It\u2019s also might obnoxious if you ever need to remove an email from that list (or, gods forbid, mass clean the list). But okay, this update is even worse. I might just stop paying for the iCloud+ whatchamacallit and backup to my Mac like I used to.", "context": "pays for iCloud+ bundle", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777141905, "item_id": 48571369, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48571369", "by": "lunatuna", "date": "2026-06-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My workflow is to use Passwords and Hide my on safari", "excerpt": "It isn\u2019t that straight forward but I use Firefox on Linux along with my iPhone and Mac. My workflow is to use Passwords and Hide my on safari and then Firefox there after on the Apple device. Firefox then saves the login details and it shows up on my Linux + Firefox desktop. Not ideal, kinda dumb, and takes away a little bit of faith in humanity, but I don\u2019t have to type in the details.", "context": "Linux, iPhone and Mac user", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777011808, "item_id": 48563238, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48563238", "by": "KomoD", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Hide My Email is pretty much the only Apple service I use", "excerpt": "Same, Hide My Email is pretty much the only Apple service I use and the aliases are only for accounts I don't really care about. I use this wonderful extension to make it easy to generate aliases https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/icloud-hide-my-email/omiaekblhgfopjkjnenhahfgcgnbohlk", "context": "", "use_case": "aliases for unimportant accounts", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777006064, "item_id": 48562879, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48562879", "by": "Marsymars", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Hide My Email largely without integration to the Apple ecosystem", "excerpt": "Does it? I use Hide My Email largely without integration to the Apple ecosystem - I generate new emails on icloud.com and copy/paste them to login forms before saving to 1Password.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 777005456, "item_id": 48562841, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48562841", "by": "Marsymars", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "before I switched to Hide My Email", "excerpt": "> I had one small business aggressively threaten me that they fully owned their business name and I wasn't allowed to use it in my email address. I haven't had that, but before I switched to Hide My Email I've had many businesses ask if I was an employee of the business - many people don't intuit the difference between john@bank.com and bank@john.com.", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 776979104, "item_id": 48561194, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48561194", "by": "Razengan", "date": "2026-06-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out.", "excerpt": "Oh fuck. I love Hide My Email and it's been the best feature about iCloud ever since it came out. It's actually useful compared to Gmail's useless \"yourrealaddress+alais\" that gives away your actual email anyway, and it helped me catch quite a few spammers/data sellers. Hide My Email addresses already have a peculiar format that others could guess, and some do block those, and there's no reason to add a blatant \"priv", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliases against spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple is about to make Hide My Email useless"}, {"id": 775068193, "item_id": 48441762, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48441762", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good", "excerpt": "I recommend people use proper email aliasing, not plus addressing. Duckduckgo makes a free one that's can integrate into Bitwarden, if you have iCloud+ Apple's($0.99/month) hide my email is good. Addy.io and SimpleLogin are the best and allow PGP encryption to prevent another party having access to your emails, but they are paid for full features. > Organizations like the IAB require that advertisers normalize email ", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "1k Data Breaches Later, the Disclosure Lag Is Worse"}, {"id": 774438192, "item_id": 48402387, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48402387", "by": "halapro", "date": "2026-06-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time", "excerpt": "This is why I love Apple's Hide My Email. I use it ALL the time and the unsubscribe button is always there. It's not the most polished interface, but it works perfectly. Also, for any subscription for which I don't use HME, I will immediately \"mark as spam\" any minimally-spammy email I get. The ones described in the article would be insta-marked due to the lack of Unsubscribe button.", "context": "", "use_case": "avoiding subscription spam", "switched_from": "", "story": "The desperation of NYTimes"}, {"id": 766827731, "item_id": 47926733, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47926733", "by": "Cider9986", "date": "2026-04-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "If you have iCloud+ Apple has an email aliasing service called Hidemyemail.", "excerpt": "I recommend anyone to use email aliasing and perhaps the Mullvad browser (if every fucking website using browser fingerprinting is getting a little tiring). These companies are just trying to suck up as much data as possible and ruin the web. Email aliasing prevents spam or linking of your emails by giving you a seperate email address to give to each service. When that service inevitably leaks your data, the leaked a", "context": "", "use_case": "email aliasing", "switched_from": "", "story": "You have to have an account to read IMDB reviews now"}]}