Question Must/Should you use a Gmail address to setup an Android phone/tablet?

[Spingel]

I'm ordering my elderly mum an android tablet since she often struggles using her smartphone.

She has always used one Hotmail email address for sending emails and setting up accounts like for an online shop.

I must have setup her phone with a Gmail address before (created purposely for the phone) as I never would've thought to use a different one.

My question is, can I just use her Hotmail address to set up her phone using Google's features such as the Play Store and possibly Google Drive?

Are there any limitations to using a non-Gmail account?


Thanks very much.

 

[joeldf]

I'm ordering my elderly mum an android tablet since she often struggles using her smartphone.

She has always used one Hotmail email address for sending emails and setting up accounts like for an online shop.

I must have setup her phone with a Gmail address before (created purposely for the phone) as I never would've thought to use a different one.

My question is, can I just use her Hotmail address to set up her phone using Google's features such as the Play Store and possibly Google Drive?

Are there any limitations to using a non-Gmail account?


Thanks very much.

You can use any working/active email account for a Google account. It does not have to be a Gmail address.

I've had a Google account for years that I started with an old ISP email account. One through my Cox internet service, so it was a cox.net type of address. I later moved to an outlook address, and updated my Google account to use that.

Still using that to this day.

There was a time that setting up an android phone did force the use of a Gmail address, back around 2012 or so, but that's no longer the case.

 

[SeeBeeEss]

Additional info HERE.