How to mail merge in Gmail: four ways, and which one fits

What a mail merge is, and why not just use BCC

You write one email with gaps in it, and keep a list with a row for each person. A mail merge fills the gaps from each row and sends a separate email to each address. So this template:

Hi {{first_name|there}},

I saw that {{company}} is hiring in {{city}}, and wanted to ask…

and a row with Riya, Pixelnest, Pune become an email to Riya that starts “Hi Riya, I saw that Pixelnest is hiring in Pune”. Nobody sees anyone else’s address, and a reply comes to you alone.

That is the difference from BCC. A BCC sends one identical message to everyone: it has no name in it, it can’t be different for each person, and it looks exactly like what it is. Use BCC for a note to a few people who know each other. Use a merge when each person should feel written to.

The four ways at a glance

The first question is your account. Google’s own mail merge isn’t on Google’s list for personal @gmail.com accounts, so if that is what you use, the first way is out. The second is where your list lives: all but the last expect it in a Google spreadsheet.

Google’s figures are from its mail merge help and its Apps Script quotas, read on 4 November 2026. Pick the row that fits, and read that section below.

Way 1: Gmail’s built-in mail merge

If you are on an eligible Google Workspace plan (Workspace Individual, Business Standard or Plus, Enterprise Standard or Plus, or Education Standard or Plus), this is the place to start. It is built in and costs nothing extra.

1. In Gmail on a computer, start a new message.
2. On the right of the “To” line, choose Use mail merge and turn it on.
3. Add recipients from a spreadsheet, or from a label in Google Contacts. In a spreadsheet, the details must be on the first tab, as text, and you pick the columns for email and first name (and last name, if you have one).
4. In the body, type @ and pick a merge tag. Tags come from your column headers.
5. Read it through, then send.

Four limits to know, all from Google’s help page:

• No tags in the subject line, in linked text or in plain-text mode.
• No Schedule send. A merge goes when you press Send.
• 1,500 recipients a day, counted together with your other sending.
• Unsubscribes are per sender. Google adds a unique link and notifies you, but you can’t get a list of everyone who unsubscribed, and they can still get mail you send without the merge, or from others on your domain.

If your emails are simple and you already pay for the plan, that may be all you need. There is a longer look in Fusomail vs Gmail’s built-in mail merge.

Way 2: Apps Script

Google publishes a small script that reads a Google Sheet, fills in a Gmail draft and sends one email per row. It is free, it works with a personal account, and you can change anything if you can write some code.

1. Copy Google’s sample spreadsheet. It has the Recipient and Email Sent columns the code needs.
2. Add your people, and a column for each thing you want to fill in.
3. In Gmail, write a draft with placeholders such as {{First name}}, matching the column headers.
4. In the sheet, open the Mail Merge menu, choose Send Emails, and paste your draft’s subject line when asked.

Two things to expect. Your first run shows a warning that “This app isn’t verified”, because the script is now your own, and you have to choose to continue. And Google’s quota for scripts is lower than Gmail’s own limit on a personal account: 100 recipients a day, against 1,500 on Workspace. Google says quotas can change without notice.

This is a good way for one person who likes tinkering, and a poor one for a business: nothing watches for empty fields, repeats, unsubscribes or failures unless you write it.

Way 3: add-ons and extensions

Add-ons put a mail merge inside Google Sheets or Gmail. They are the most common way people do this, and they differ more than they appear to. Three well-known ones:

• YAMM runs from a Google Sheet, and can attach a different Drive file for each person. Fusomail vs YAMM.
• Mailmeteor has a web dashboard as well as add-ons, with reply detection and follow-ups on its paid plans. Fusomail vs Mailmeteor.
• GMass is a Chrome extension inside Gmail, built for cold outreach with sequences and A/B tests. Fusomail vs GMass.

Before you install one, compare what you will really need: the daily limit on the plan you can afford, whether it reads your list from where you keep it, and what happens to people who unsubscribe. And read Google’s consent screen before you press Allow: it lists exactly what the tool may do with your account, and these lists vary a lot.

Way 4: a web app that sends through your Gmail

The last way keeps your list out of Google Sheets altogether. You upload a file to a separate app and connect your Gmail, and it sends each email through your own account, so people see your address and replies reach your inbox. Fusomail, which is ours, works this way. Here is how it goes.

1. Prepare your list

Save it as .csv or .xlsx from Excel, Numbers, a CRM or Google Sheets. Put one row of column names at the top, one person on each row and one address in each email cell. Remove merged cells and blank rows, and any notes above the headers. Every column becomes a field, so a column called Company is {{company}}.

2. Write the email

Write it as you would to one person, and put fields in the subject and body. Where someone may have no value, give a fallback: {{first_name|there}} reads “Hi there” instead of “Hi ,”. People with an empty field and no fallback are listed before anything is sent.

3. Check it

Preview the email for a few different people, especially anyone with odd or missing data. Send yourself a test. On Starter and up you can also run email verification and the deliverability check; the free spam word checker and domain checker do part of that for anyone.

4. Send, at a sensible pace

Fusomail sends from your account with a gap between emails (20 seconds by default), up to 400 a day on personal Gmail and 1,500 on Workspace, and carries on the next day. You can pause, resume or cancel, and see each person’s status as it changes.

What it can’t do today: spot replies, attach a different file for each person, or send from Outlook. The features page says what is ready and what isn’t. The Free plan sends 200 emails a month, with no card.

How many you can send

Whichever way you choose, Google’s own limit applies: about 500 emails a day on personal Gmail and 2,000 on Google Workspace, over a rolling 24 hours. Go over and you can’t send anything for up to a day, including your ordinary mail.

So a list of 2,000 on a personal account is a job of several days, whatever tool you use. The sending limit calculator works it out for your list, and the guide to Gmail sending limits has the whole picture.

Fields that read as if you wrote them

A first name alone fools nobody now. What makes a merged email feel personal is a detail only you would mention, and you can keep that in a column.

• Add a line per person. A column called opening with a sentence you wrote for each one (“Liked your talk at the Pune meetup”) does more than any number of name fields.
• Check your casing. A list from a form holds “riya”, “RIYA” and “Riya Kapoor”. Clean it before you import.
• Give fallbacks a natural sound. “Hi there” works. “Hi Valued Customer” doesn’t.
• Read one aloud. Pick the shortest and longest values in a column and preview them: a long company name can break a sentence.

The rules to keep to

A mail merge is sent by you, from your own name, so its rules and its reputation are yours. Three things matter wherever you are:

• Have a reason to write to each person. Rules differ by country; some allow business outreach with a clear way out, others need consent first. Don’t use bought or scraped lists: they break most of these rules, and Fusomail’s terms forbid them.
• Make leaving easy, and remember it. Include an unsubscribe link, and never email that person again from any campaign. Fusomail adds the link and keeps a suppression list for the whole workspace.
• Watch what people do. Google’s sender guidelines ask every sender to keep reported spam below 0.3%. Nothing hurts more than people pressing Report spam.

This is general information and not legal advice.

A checklist before you press Send

• The list has one row per person, with no duplicates and no one who asked not to hear from you.
• Every field used has a value or a fallback.
• You have read the preview for your shortest, longest and emptiest rows.
• The subject says what is inside, with no shouting or Re: on a new email.
• You have sent yourself a test and opened it on your phone.
• There are one or two links at most, and they work.
• There is a way to unsubscribe.
• You know how many days it will take, and you haven’t promised anyone it will arrive sooner.