Email, Messaging, & Video Calls Email How to Edit a Recipient's Email Address or Name in Gmail Tweak a recipient's info right from the Compose screen by Heinz Tschabitscher Writer A former freelance contributor who has reviewed hundreds of email programs and services since 1997. our editorial process Heinz Tschabitscher Updated on February 19, 2021 reviewed by Jon Fisher Lifewire Tech Review Board Member Jonathan Fisher is a CompTIA certified technologist with more than 6 years' experience writing for publications like TechNorms and Help Desk Geek. our review board Article reviewed on Feb 11, 2021 Jon Fisher Tweet Share Email Email Gmail Yahoo! Mail Given that most people have multiple email addresses nowadays — one for work and another for personal use, for example — Gmail likely has stored more than one for many of your contacts. As a result, Gmail might auto-populate the To, CC, or BCC field with the wrong entry as you begin to enter the name of your email recipient. However, Gmail makes editing this info quite easy right from the New Message window. These instructions are written for desktop users to follow along. How to Change the Email Recipient on a New Message To change or edit the email address for a recipient when you write a new email or reply, you don't have to remove the recipient altogether or type it manually. Instead: Double-click the recipient whose address or name you want to edit. Make the desired changes to the recipient's name or address. As you enter a few letters in the To, CC, or BCC field, Gmail will present matching choices in a drop-down menu. Either select the appropriate address from the menu or continue entering the address manually. Select Enter. If you suspect you clicked Enter with a wrong address, you may be able to unsend in Gmail if you act quickly. Edit Contact Information If you are attempting to email someone from your contact list, but that person's name or email address is not appearing as it should, it might be entered incorrectly in your Gmail contacts. Modifying the contact information could resolve the issue. Log into Gmail. Select the Google Apps menu in the upper-right corner and choose Contacts. You can also go directly to contacts.google.com. As long as you are logged into Google, your contacts will appear automatically. Otherwise, you will be prompted to log into your Google account. Hover over the contact you want to edit and select the Edit Contact icon on the right end, which looks like a pencil. The card for that contact will open. Change the name, email address or other information. After you select Show More you can enter a name in the File As field that helps you find the recipient more easily. The name entered in the First Name and Last Name fields will be displayed in the To, Cc or Bcc fields when you send the recipient an email message. Select Save to apply the changes. The recipient's name and email address should appear correctly in messages going forward. Was this page helpful? Thanks for letting us know! Get the Latest Tech News Delivered Every Day Email Address Sign up There was an error. Please try again. You're in! Thanks for signing up. There was an error. Please try again. Thank you for signing up. Tell us why! Other Not enough details Hard to understand Submit