File Size Limits for Emails

Tech Questions

Jul 25

Internet email accounts enforce file size limits on attachments for performance and security reasons. If there were no limits to file sizes, users would send huge files causing the email service to be bombarded with very large emails and performance would decrease tremendously.

What are the combined file size limits for common email providers (per email)?

1. Outlook - 20 megabytes (MB)

2. Gmail - 25 megabytes (MB)

3. Yahoo Mail - 25 MB

4. AOL - 25 MB

5. iCloud - 20 MB

So, if you get an error message while trying to attach files larger than the maximum size limit, now you know the limit.

There are a few workarounds that can help

1. Use email and cloud storage services

You can use iCloud, OneDrive, or products like DropBox to upload documents and share the links to them via email.

For example:

Outlook - the size limit for attachment is increased to 2 GB, when you attach the file from OneDrive cloud.

Gmail - the size limit for attachment is increased to 10 GB, when you use Google Drive cloud.

2. Create a Zip file

If you have a folder or file, you can create compress the files, creating a zip folder. This may decrease the file size enough to fit within your mail's size limits.

How to Zip and Unzip files in Windows 10: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/zip-and-unzip-files-f6dde0a7-0fec-8294-e1d3-703ed85e7ebc#v1h=tab01

3. Use Online File Compressors

There are many online file compressors that can be used. Here are a few of my preferred ones:

1. Adobe:https://www.adobe.com/acrobat/online/compress-pdf.html

2. Compress PDF https://smallpdf.com/compress-pdf

3. We compress https://www.wecompress.com/en/