Google for (almost) everything...

Several years back, my wife was doing freelance business and needed a higher tier of Google Drive storage. We already had Office365 accounts with custom domain email, but she needed to use Google Drive for a client, so I switched us over to GSuite Basic accounts. We used these accounts for everything, including our combined almost 1 TB photos and video library.

Family Link

When we got our first Chromebook, my first encounter with the "you can't use that account here" dialog. There are services that GSuite accounts can't use, which was a surprise to me. Instead I had to use my older, personal Google account to setup Family Link and manage my kids on their Chromebooks. This is a glaring oversight.

Migration sans automation

When we left Microsoft, we didn't lose our email accounts, they just reverted to a free tier and you lost your custom domain and any other services you paid for. But you could still get messages and access your inbox, just like any other personal account.

But with GSuite, once you cancel, your Workspace is removed permanently. This makes it extremely difficult to get away from GSuite, as it is on you to move those services one by one. Manually. And migration will still lose things, like organizational features like email tags or photo albums, even if you move to a personal Google account. Quick to get in, slow to get out. Just like Vegas.

There can be only (Google) One

So fast forward to 2021 and I'm still paying $24/month for a GSuite Basic account for my wife and I. My wife no longer has the business need she had, and I'm looking at Google's newest offering, Google One, which is only $9.99/month. A much better deal, but how much pain will transitioning be?

No way out

Everything about this migration is an arduous, painful process. That is what I'll be documenting here and what hoops I had to jump through to get back into a normal setup.

In the days ahead I'll share moving specific services like Drive, Photos, Docs and Gmail to personal accounts.