Gmail Blue Checkmark: Everything You Need to Know

Google's Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) feature allows organisations to authenticate their emails using DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) to validate ownership of the corporate logos.

Previously, Google used to show organisations’ logos as profile pictures in emails only after the verification using BIMI. However, with the new Blue Checkmark feature in Gmail, emails from all the organisations having completed BIMI verification will show up with the corporate logo and a blue checkmark. BIMI requires companies to use strong authentication and verify brand logos to use the logo as an avatar.

BIMI is currently only available for organisations and not for individuals. Organisations can get verified on Gmail by registering their brand logos as a word mark with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and setting up BIMI for their organisation. The BIMI TXT record is a line of text that includes the URL of the brand logo SVG, and after making the BIMI records, the organisation must add those to their domain name in their domain name provider.

It is important to note that the eligibility for a Gmail Blue Checkmark requires the organisation to be a Google Workspace user, use its domain name for email, and have access to domain name hosting of the organisation's domain.