Google is updating its productivity suite once again, and some of the improvements will cost you money. In this essay, you will learn about several crucial details that you should be aware of.

Gmail and Google Calendar, Google’s email and calendar services, used to be the same way—everyone had access to the same tool. Thanks to Google Workspace Individual, this is no longer the case.

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What is Google Workspace Individual, and How Does it Work?

Google Workspace Individual is now available for $10 per month for personal Google users (essentially anyone with a @gmail.com email address). With that, they get:

Google Calendar has an appointment scheduling tool built in (similar to Calendly)
Gmail and Google Contacts both have an email marketing function built-in (similar to Mailchimp)
Calls using Google Meet can last up to an hour (equivalent to Zoom’s subscription plan).
Support is available 24 hours a day, 7 days

This is a potentially attractive package, especially if you’re already paying for appointment scheduling, email marketing, and video conferencing software. Still, you might be curious about the features, how this service differs from other Google paid services, and whether it’s worth $120 each year.

There was a free version of Google Workspace when it was first released in 2006 (under the name “Google Apps For Your Domain”). Google has declared that customers who have been using the service for free will have to start paying. You would believe that Google Workspace Individual is designed for them, but that isn’t the case. Despite the same name, this service is not the same as Google Workspace. For example, you can’t utilize Google Workspace Individual with a custom domain name. You also can’t manage many users, despite the name.

I’m getting ahead of myself, though. Let’s take a look at what Google Workspace Individual has to offer—and what it doesn’t.

Longer calls and more on Google Meet

Google Meet is a video conferencing service that is most closely related to Zoom. The free edition of that program allows you to make 40-minute calls, whereas Google Meet allows you to make 60-minute calls for free.

Individual subscribers of Google Workspace can host meetings for up to 100 people for up to 24 hours. Zoom’s cheapest paid plan, which allows for 30-hour calls with up to 100 participants, costs $12.50 per month, thus Google Workspace Individual, at $10 per month, is likely worth it for this feature alone.

Workspace Individual customers also have access to a few extra Meet capabilities, which are detailed on the Google Meet pricing page. These users can:

Google Drive is a great place to save meeting recordings.
Provide attendees with a phone number to call into the meeting.
Make arrangements for a breakaway room, surveys, and hand-raising.
Noise cancellation should be enabled.

Although Zoom is the industry standard for video calls, I believe Google Meet is worth investigating—especially if it is less expensive.

You can build a scheduling tool in Google Calendar

The option to create an Appointment Schedule is maybe the most intriguing feature. You may set a time for people to sign up for an appointment in Google Calendar.

This is similar to but less customizable than, Calendly’s free version, with the added benefit of being able to do everything without leaving Google Calendar. This is probably not worth signing up for, but it’s great to have.

You can build an Email Marketing tool in Gmail

Individual users can choose from a range of templates while composing an email in Google Workspace.

How to enable Email Templates

Open Gmail.
At the top right, click Settings and then See all settings.
At the top, click Advanced.
In the Templates section, select Enable.
At the bottom, click Save Changes.

How to create or change templates

Note: You can create up to 50 templates.

Open Gmail and click Compose.
In the Compose window, enter your template text.
Click More and then Templates.
Choose an option:

To create a new template, click Save draft as a template and then save as a new template.

To change a previously saved template, click Save draft as a template and under Overwrite Template, choose a template and click Save to overwrite it.

(Optional) To send an email, compose your message and click Send.

How to insert templates

Open Gmail and click Compose.
Click More and then Templates.
To insert a template, under Insert template, choose a saved template to insert in your email.
Compose the rest of your message and click Send.

How to Delete templates

Open Gmail and click Compose.
Click More and then Template.
To delete a template, click Delete template, choose the template you want to delete, and click Delete.

Set automation to send an email with templates

Open Gmail.
In the search box at the top, click Show search options.
Enter your search criteria. If you want to check that your search worked correctly, see what emails show up by clicking Search.
At the bottom of the search window, click Create filter.
Choose what you’d like the filter to do.
Click Create filter.

If you are a Workspace Individual subscriber, you can create a branded email and send it to many recipients at once. These Gmail templates allow you to rapidly send a professional-looking email newsletter.

You can alter the background color, add a custom footer, and include social network links (but not much more). A multi-send function is also available, which sends a separate copy of each email to different people using Google Contacts mailing lists. If your readers wish, they can unsubscribe from these mailing lists.

This is about as basic an email marketing solution as you can get—user stats aren’t even included. The biggest advantage is that you can accomplish everything without having to leave Gmail.

The majority of people who are serious about sending a newsletter should search somewhere else. I’m not sure why anyone would use this instead of Mailchimp, which has a free version that allows you to send emails to up to 2,000 people, Substack, or Buttondown, which can both send a newsletter to as many people as you can get to sign up. Still, it’s wonderful to see something like this in Gmail, and I can see it becoming a more powerful tool over time.

Google Workspace Individual doesn’t come with any additional Space Storage

Gmail, Google Drive, and Google Photos are all limited to 17 gigabytes (GB) of storage for free users. Google Workspace clients get more storage—the cheapest plan, which starts at $6 per user, includes 30 GB of storage.

The $10 per user Google Workspace Individual version does not provide any additional storage space above the free version. Individuals who require additional storage must purchase a Google One account in addition to their Google Workspace Individual membership. For $2 per month, you can get 100 GB of storage.

How Google Workspace for Business is different?

Until recently, Google Workspace was only available to businesses. G-Suite was the name until recently; before that, it was Google Apps for Your Domain.

Companies may use Gmail for their work email addresses and have safe access to Google Docs, Calendar, and other applications for a monthly per-user subscription. If you don’t have a domain name, you won’t be able to use this service.

Even after factoring in the cost of a domain name (usually $15 per year), Google Workspace starts at $6 per user per year, which is actually less expensive than Google Workspace Individual. This package also comes with nearly twice as much storage as Google Workspace Individual.

As a result, some users may wish to purchase a domain name and set up Google Workspace for Business.

It’s not a bad concept, however, keep in mind the following: Workspace for Business does not have capabilities that Google Workspace Individual possesses. The email marketing capabilities and the appointment scheduling tool, which are both significant selling points of Google Workspace Individual, aren’t available in the commercial edition of Google Workspace right now. Is that unclear? Yes. Will it ever change? Probably. But, for the time being, that is the situation.