# How to share one email inbox with a team without sharing the password

Use Gmail delegation, a Google Groups Collaborative Inbox or a Microsoft 365 shared mailbox. Each person signs in as themselves, and no password changes hands.

Updated: November 10, 2026

A team that answers info@ or support@ doesn't need one password that everyone knows. Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 each have a feature for this. People sign in as themselves and open the shared inbox from their own account. When a person leaves the team, you take that one person off and nothing else changes.

## Why a shared password is the hard way

With one password for the inbox, every departure creates work. Someone has to change the password and get the new one to everyone who stays. Until that happens, the person who left can still read new mail. Gmail Help also warns that when several people sign in to one Gmail account from different places, Gmail may lock the account for a while. If the address also has two-step verification, the codes go to one phone, and whoever holds it becomes the bottleneck. [Sharing two-step verification across a team](/guides/shared-accounts/sharing-two-step-verification) covers that problem on its own.

The features below avoid all of this because the inbox is never the thing a person signs in to.

## Gmail: add delegates

Gmail Help defines a delegate as "someone who can read, send, and delete emails in your account for you." A delegate can't use chat or change your password. When a delegate sends mail, Gmail shows their address too, though a Workspace admin can set delegated mail to show only the owner's address.

The owner of the inbox adds delegates on a computer. In Gmail, the path is Settings, See all settings, and the Accounts and Import tab, which some accounts show as Accounts. Under "Grant access to your account," choose Add another account, type the person's email address, and send the invitation. Plan for a delay. The person has a week to accept before the invitation expires, and after they accept, access can take up to a day to start. They then open the inbox from the account menu under their profile picture, where it is marked "Delegated."

These limits apply.

- Up to 10 delegates on a personal @gmail.com account, and up to 1,000 on a work or school account.
- Only 40 can use the inbox at the same time with typical use.
- A work account can add only people or groups in its own organization.
- In Google Workspace, none of this works until an admin turns it on, under Mail delegation in the Admin console. The same setting can let a Google group be a delegate, and a group counts as one delegate.

Delegation hands over the mail and little else. Gmail Help lists features that delegates don't get, including access to the owner's Google Account settings.

## Google Groups: a Collaborative Inbox

A Google group has its own email address, such as support@, and people post to the group by sending mail to it. With Collaborative Inbox features turned on, members sign in to Google Groups with their own accounts and work on the group's conversations there.

Two settings decide whether that works for a public address. Google's Create a group page warns that a group created in a work or school account may get a suffix on its address, such as "-user-created." The address may then not come out as support@. Google's admin help says the suffix isn't added to groups made in the Admin console, so ask your Workspace admin to create the group there. Then check the Who can post setting, which controls who can send mail to the group's address, and make sure it includes the people who write to you.

What this adds over delegation is a way to divide the work. A member with the right permission can take a conversation or assign it to another member, and the assignee gets an email notice. Members can then search the group for conversations assigned to them, to anyone, or to no one yet. Setting it up falls to the group's owner or a manager. They turn on conversation history, select Collaborative Inbox in the group's settings, and give members the permission to take and assign conversations.

Choose this when several people answer the same address and you need to know who has each message. Choose delegation when people only need to read and answer, whether that is one assistant or a team.

## Microsoft 365: a shared mailbox

Microsoft's version is the shared mailbox: one address, such as info@ or support@, that a group of people watch and send from. An admin creates it in the Microsoft 365 admin center and adds members. Members open it from their own Outlook.

Microsoft's guidance on the password is specific. Each shared mailbox comes with a user account whose password the system generates and nobody is meant to use. Microsoft's instruction: "Always block sign-in for the shared mailbox account and keep it blocked."

Microsoft lists what to know before you create one.

- The shared mailbox needs no license up to 50 GB. Each member needs their own licensed Exchange Online mailbox.
- Up to 25 people can use it. For more, Microsoft points you to a Microsoft 365 group.
- Members must be people in your organization.
- Two permissions control the sender line: Send As shows only the mailbox, and Send on Behalf shows the member "on behalf of" the mailbox.
- Any member can delete mail, and a shared mailbox has no setting to stop that.

A Microsoft 365 group is where Microsoft sends you in three cases: members outside your business, more than 25 users, or a need to stop people deleting mail.

## Which one fits

| Situation | Feature to use |
| --- | --- |
| An assistant handles an executive's Gmail | Gmail delegation |
| A team answers a Google Workspace address and doesn't need to assign messages | Gmail delegation, to each person or to a Google group |
| A team answers a Google Workspace address and needs to assign messages | Collaborative Inbox |
| A team answers a Microsoft 365 address | Shared mailbox |
| More than 25 people in Microsoft 365, or outside members | Microsoft 365 group |

Delegation and shared mailboxes are for people who have an account in your organization. A contractor without one can't be a delegate or a shared mailbox member. One answer is to give that person an account in your organization for the length of the engagement. [Giving company accounts to employees, contractors and temps](/guides/outsourcing-access/employees-contractors-temps-account-access) covers what to decide first.

## Moving off a shared password

1. List who knows the inbox password today, including people who have left.
2. Set up delegation, a Collaborative Inbox or a shared mailbox, and add each current team member. If the address is already an ordinary Microsoft 365 mailbox, an admin can convert it, and the mail and calendar entries already in it are kept.
3. Have each person confirm they can read and send from their own account.
4. Close off the old password. For a Gmail inbox, change it and don't hand it out again. A converted Microsoft 365 mailbox needs more care. Microsoft's convert page warns that unless you reset the password, the old username and password keep working on the converted mailbox. So reset it, then check that sign-in is blocked on the mailbox's account. A shared mailbox you create new has sign-in blocked from the start.
5. Add the inbox and its members to your list of shared accounts, so that offboarding includes removing people from it. [How to take inventory of shared accounts](/guides/shared-accounts/shared-account-inventory) shows what to record.

Some addresses can't move, because they are the login for another service or live on a mail system without delegation. Those stay [shared accounts you can't split](/guides/shared-accounts/when-accounts-cannot-be-split), and need a different way to track who used them.


## Frequently asked questions

**Can several people use one Gmail inbox without knowing the password?**

Yes. The owner adds each person as a delegate. Delegates sign in to their own Google Account and open the shared inbox from the account menu. A delegate can read, send and delete mail but can't change the password.

**Does a Microsoft 365 shared mailbox have a password?**

Yes, but nobody is meant to use it. The system generates it, and Microsoft says to block sign-in for the mailbox's account and keep it blocked. Members open the mailbox from their own accounts.

**Can we add a freelancer to our shared inbox?**

Not directly. Gmail delegation and a Microsoft 365 shared mailbox both stop at people in your organization, so the freelancer needs an account there first. For outside people, Microsoft points to a Microsoft 365 group instead.

**How many people can share one inbox?**

A Microsoft 365 shared mailbox supports up to 25 users. A work or school Gmail account can have up to 1,000 delegates, and with typical use 40 can be in it at the same time.

**How do we remove someone who left the team?**

Remove their delegate entry in Gmail, their group membership in Google Groups, or their permissions on the shared mailbox. You don't change a password, because they never had one.

## Sources

- [Gmail Help: Delegate & collaborate on email](https://support.google.com/mail/answer/138350?hl=en)
- [Google Workspace Help: Let users delegate access to a Gmail account](https://knowledge.workspace.google.com/admin/gmail/let-users-delegate-access-to-a-gmail-account)
- [Google Workspace Learning Center: Use a group as a Collaborative Inbox](https://support.google.com/a/users/answer/167430?hl=en)
- [Google Workspace Learning Center: Make a group a Collaborative Inbox](https://support.google.com/a/users/answer/10375787?hl=en)
- [Google Workspace Learning Center: Create a group](https://support.google.com/a/users/answer/9303222?hl=en)
- [Microsoft Learn: About shared mailboxes in Microsoft 365](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/admin/email/about-shared-mailboxes?view=o365-worldwide)
- [Microsoft Learn: Create a shared mailbox](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/admin/email/create-a-shared-mailbox?view=o365-worldwide)
- [Microsoft Learn: Shared mailboxes in Exchange Online](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/collaboration-exo/shared-mailboxes)
- [Microsoft Learn: Convert a user mailbox to a shared mailbox](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/admin/email/convert-user-mailbox-to-shared-mailbox)
- [Google Workspace Help: Mark user-created groups with a suffix](https://knowledge.workspace.google.com/admin/groups/mark-user-created-groups-with-a-suffix)

## How Junify handles this

**Doing this by hand** To keep shared accounts safe, you track who knows each password, and change it and send out the new one whenever someone leaves. You also keep a separate record of who did what under the same login.

**With Junify** Use delegation or a shared mailbox for inboxes inside Google Workspace or Microsoft 365. Junify is for the accounts they don't cover, such as a login on another service that outside staff have to use. Your admin adds that login to Junify. People verify on their own phone and click to sign in without seeing the password, and each use is recorded by person. A person who leaves the team is taken off that login in Junify.

Junify is an access management service for handing work in your web accounts to employees, contractors and outside teams without giving them the password. Each person verifies on their own phone and clicks a card to sign in. The password is never shown, and Junify records who used which account and when.

- [Try the demo](https://www.junify.com/bpo/try?lang=en&scenario=shared-accounts&from=guide&cluster=shared-accounts&slug=sharing-an-email-inbox-with-a-team)
- [Book a 30-minute demo](https://www.junify.com/bpo/demo)

## More on this topic

- [Can a team share one Canva account at work?](/guides/shared-accounts/sharing-canva-accounts-at-work): No. Canva's Terms of Use require a separate account for every person and bar letting anyone else use your login. For several people, set up a Canva team.
- [How 1Password and Junify differ for shared accounts](/guides/shared-accounts/1password-and-junify): 1Password fits storing and sharing each employee's own passwords. Junify fits shared accounts people should use without seeing the password. You can run both.
- [How Bitwarden and Junify differ for shared accounts at work](/guides/shared-accounts/bitwarden-and-junify): Bitwarden fits employees who keep their own passwords and share some with trusted coworkers. Junify fits shared accounts used without seeing the password.