Email without
phone verification
13 of these 20 providers have no phone step at all. Filter the list, see the catch for each, and go straight to the signup page.
- No phone
Tuta — formerly Tutanota
free · 1 GBNo phone field anywhere in signup. Free accounts can be held for manual review (often ~48h) before activation — that review is how they fight abuse instead of asking for a number. End-to-end encrypted, German jurisdiction.
Open Tuta signup → - No phone
Mailfence
free · 500 MBFree tier signs up with an existing email address only, no number. Belgian jurisdiction, OpenPGP built in.
Open Mailfence signup → - No phone
Disroot
free · 1 GBVolunteer-run activist collective, no phone. Signup is a short request form and can take a little while. Treat uptime as best-effort, not commercial SLA.
Open Disroot signup → - No phone
mail.com
free · 65 GBNormally completes with no number — recovery phone is offered but skippable. Ad-supported, and the free inbox has no IMAP on some plans. Large choice of domains.
Open mail.com signup → - No phone
GMX
free · 65 GBSame parent company as mail.com and the same pattern — phone offered for recovery, generally skippable. Ad-supported.
Open GMX signup → - No phone
Posteo
€1/mo · 2 GBDeliberately collects no personal data at all — no name, no number — and accepts anonymous payment (cash by post). Cheapest genuinely-private option. Not free.
Open Posteo signup → - No phone
mailbox.org
€1/mo · 2 GBNo phone step; German provider, strong on encryption and standards (IMAP/SMTP, custom domains). Paid only, 30-day trial.
Open mailbox.org signup → - Sometimes
Proton Mail
free · 1 GBFree signup asks for a human check that may be CAPTCHA, an existing email, OR a phone number — which one you get depends on risk signals. Over Tor/VPN or a datacenter IP it much more often demands the number. Retrying from a normal residential connection usually avoids it.
Open Proton Mail signup → - Sometimes
Outlook / Hotmail
free · 15 GBUsually a puzzle/CAPTCHA rather than a number, but Microsoft escalates to phone verification on flagged IPs or rapid repeat signups. Often the easiest mainstream inbox to get without a number.
Open Outlook / Hotmail signup → - Sometimes
AOL Mail
free · 1 TBAsks for a number during signup but has historically allowed skipping to an alternate-email path; the prompt is inconsistent by region.
Open AOL Mail signup → - Usually required
Zoho Mail
free · 5 GBWas a well-known no-phone option for years; mobile verification is now the norm on free signups. Still excellent if you have a number to give.
Open Zoho Mail signup → - Usually required
Gmail
free · 15 GBPhone verification is effectively standard now, especially on Android, a new device, or any VPN. Desktop signups occasionally still skip it, but do not plan on it.
Open Gmail signup → - Usually required
Yandex Mail
free · 5 GBPhone confirmation is required in practice. Also consider the jurisdiction before putting anything sensitive in it.
Open Yandex Mail signup → - Usually required
iCloud Mail
free · 5 GBNeeds an Apple Account, and those effectively require a verified number. Hide My Email (aliases) is genuinely good but sits behind that same account.
Open iCloud Mail signup → - No phone
SimpleLogin
free · alias onlyNot an inbox — generates aliases that forward to a mailbox you already own. No number. The right tool when you want to stop handing your real address to every signup. Owned by Proton.
Open SimpleLogin signup → - No phone
addy.io — formerly AnonAddy
free · alias onlyOpen-source alias forwarder, no phone, generous free tier, self-hostable. Same idea as SimpleLogin.
Open addy.io signup → - No phone
Firefox Relay
free · alias onlyAlias forwarder tied to a Mozilla account (email + password, no number). Five free masks.
Open Firefox Relay signup → - No phone
Guerrilla Mail
free · temporaryNo signup whatsoever — an inbox exists the moment you open the page. Publicly readable by anyone who guesses the address, so never use it for anything you need to keep or recover.
Open Guerrilla Mail signup → - No phone
Mailinator
free · temporaryPublic catch-all inboxes for testing. Anyone can read any address. Widely blocklisted by signup forms.
Open Mailinator signup → - No phone
Maildrop
free · temporarySame public-inbox model, cleaner interface, no signup. Fine for one-off confirmations, unsafe for accounts you care about.
Open Maildrop signup →
“Does it need a phone number?” has no single answer for Gmail, Outlook, Proton or AOL, because they decide per signup from risk signals — VPN or Tor, datacenter IP, a brand-new device, your region, how many accounts that IP already made. That is why those rows say Sometimes or Usually instead of yes or no. If you need a guarantee, use a provider that has no phone field at all: Tuta or Mailfence free, Posteo or mailbox.org for about €1/mo.
And if what you actually want is to stop giving sites your real address rather than to avoid a number, an alias service solves that better than a second inbox does.
Signup policies change often — last verified 2026-07-25