Our phones have become do-it-all gadgets. They enable us to keep in touch with one another, track how many steps we’re taking each day, snap photos of everything, and access the collective knowledge of humanity. All that universal functionality extends across both our work and personal lives.
The gadget that pings you on Slack when your colleague has a question is the same one that alerts you when your friend has just outscored you at Wordle. That blurring of boundaries can be a problem.
There is actually a solution to this, at least if you’re using an Android phone. Android supports the use of multiple profiles (based on Google accounts), so you can switch between two different ones as needed. The most obvious use case for this is to split up your work and personal usage.
It’s essentially like having two phones on the same physical device: The profile that’s active dictates the apps you can use, the notifications you see, the browsing history you can dig into, and the files you’ve got access to, all dictated by the Google account.
Note that while this feature has been around in Android for a long time and is available on many handsets (including Pixel phones), not every Android manufacturer has implemented it. It’s not available on Galaxy phones, for example, though Samsung does offer something similar with the Secure Folder.
Get Started
To begin with, you’re going to need two Google accounts, but many of us already have a Google account managed by work anyway. If not, you can set up a new Google account, free of charge, to use as the basis of the work profile on your phone: Head to the Google account portal on the web, then click Create an account.
The details you’ll need to provide include a first name, your birthday, and a Gmail address you’d like to register to use with the account—this is what you’ll use to sign in to this account on your phone and on the web. You get some suggestions for an available address based on your name, but you can also come up with something custom as long as no one else has taken it first.
Once you’ve got a second account you can use, open Settings, then choose System > Users. Tap Add user, then Next, and you’re able to give a name to the second user account. With that done, select it from the Users screen, choose the Switch to… option, and you’ll be taken through the process of signing in to your secondary Google account.
The setup process that follows is very similar to the one for setting up your phone in the first place. You can set a PIN code, a fingerprint scan, or a face scan (depending on the options your phone offers) to stop other people from accessing your account, and you will be asked to work through the various Android terms-and-conditions screens.
Using Your Second Profile
After you’ve set up a second profile, you’ll be taken straight to it. It will make your phone look like a brand-new device, with the default home screen layout and wallpaper in place. Any configuration changes you’ve made to Android on your main account will have to be done on this secondary one too.
There are a couple of ways to switch between profiles. You can head to Settings > System > Users and pick an account from the list, or you can do a two-finger swipe down from the top of the screen to open Quick Settings and tap the user account icon underneath the widgets (it’s just to the left of the settings cog icon).
You’ll need to configure all of your apps again on this secondary account—which is the point of the extra profile, after all. Open up Google Photos, for example, and you’ll be prompted to go through the process of choosing your backup options again. You’ll also need to install the apps you need on this secondary account, which can be a different set from those on your other profile.
Some parts of the Android experience are shared between profiles, including Wi-Fi network information. However, you won’t be able to see saved files or apps in your second profile from your original one (or vice versa). You might want to install a third-party cloud storage app if you need to share files between accounts regularly.
On the Settings > System > Users screen for your primary account, you’ll see an Allow user switch option: You can turn this off if you want to temporarily disable user switching (it removes the icon on Quick Settings, for example), but it won’t remove the second account from your phone. To do that, select it on the Users screen and pick Delete user.
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