To sign up for some Google Workspace services, such as a Business edition, you can use your Gmail address (ends in gmail.com) or verify either your business email address (ends in @company.com) or ownership of your organization's domain name. With Gmail or business email verification, only a limited set of features is available. To use all of the features available with the service, you need to verify ownership of your domain.
To sign up for Google Workspace Essentials Starter, only business email verification is available. To get more features, you need to switch to a different edition of Google Workspace and verify your domain.
The following table compares organizations with Gmail, business email, and domain-verified accounts
| Gmail accounts | Business email accounts | Domain-verified accounts | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Administration | Single user only | Limited, with basic sharing policies | Advanced polices for sharing, access, and security |
| Gmail | Yes | No | Yes (except Essentials editions) |
| Google Calendar | Yes | Yes, with Essentials editions only | Yes |
| Advanced user features for Google Drive, Google Meet, and Google Chat | No, basic features only | No, basic features only | Yes |
| Google Account ownership | User owned | User owned | Organization owned |
| User data management | Admins manage only their own data for apps included in the service | Admins manage users' data only for apps included with the service, such as Google Drive, Meet, and Chat | Admins manage all user data for core and additional services |
| Adding users | No | Invite a user with a Google Account in your domain to join Google Workspace | Create a new Google Account for each user |
| Deleting users | No | Remove accounts from Google Workspace; users keep their account | Permanently delete accounts |
| Admin roles | Super Admin only (single user) | Super Admin only | Super Admin role, prebuilt delegated and custom admin roles |