How to Configure Email Routing Rules in Google Workspace Admin Console

The Need for Advanced Email Routing

In a standard Google Workspace deployment, email routing is straightforward: an email sent to [email protected] is delivered directly to that user’s Gmail inbox. However, enterprise environments often require complex mail flow rules. You might need to route all emails sent to a former employee to their manager, silently forward copies of all outgoing sales emails to an archive server, or route emails with specific attachments through a third-party spam filter before they reach the inbox.

Google Workspace handles all of these scenarios through the Routing settings in the Admin Console. Setting up these rules gives you granular, server-level control over every message entering or leaving your domain.

Step 1: Access the Routing Settings

1. Log into the Google Workspace Admin Console (admin.google.com) using a Super Administrator account.
2. Navigate to Apps > Google Workspace > Gmail.
3. Scroll down and click on Routing.

Step 2: Create a New Routing Rule

In the Routing section, you will see a list of existing rules (if any). To create a new one, click the Configure or Add Another Rule button.

Give your rule a descriptive name, such as “Forward Former Employee Emails to Manager”.

Step 3: Define the Email Triggers

Google Workspace will ask you to define exactly which emails this rule should apply to. You have four primary options:

• Inbound: Emails coming from outside your organization.
• Outbound: Emails leaving your organization.
• Internal – Receiving: Emails sent between users inside your domain (evaluated when received).
• Internal – Sending: Emails sent between users inside your domain (evaluated when sent).

Check the boxes that apply to your scenario. For example, if you want to catch emails sent from external clients to a former employee, check Inbound.

Step 4: Define the Conditions

Next, you must specify the exact conditions that trigger the rule. Scroll down to the envelope filter section and select Only affect specific envelope senders/receivers.

Choose Pattern match and enter the specific email address (e.g., [email protected]). You can also use advanced Regular Expressions (RegEx) to match entire subdomains or specific naming conventions.

Step 5: Define the Action

Finally, tell Google Workspace what to do when it intercepts a matching email. Scroll down to the Modifications section. You have immense power here:

• Change route: Redirect the email to an entirely different mail server.
• Add custom headers: Inject custom X-Headers for downstream processing.
• Change envelope recipient: Rewrite the “To” address (e.g., changing [email protected] to [email protected]).
• Add more recipients: Silently BCC another address.

Once you have configured the action, click Save at the bottom. The rule will propagate across Google’s global mail servers and take effect within 1 to 24 hours.