If you’ve been around the Apple world for a while, you probably have more than 1 email address that you’ve used to login with. It can get really confusing when they then ask for your Apple ID to login to your iCloud account. Hopefully we can clear some of this up and help you understand your iCloud account a bit better.

In the pre-iCloud world, Apple handed out @mac.com email accounts. You definitely have some history if you have one of those. Then came along the @me.com accounts when they made the first move to the cloud. In a sense it allowed you to have a “nickname” for your email so you didn’t have to give out your real email address.

Once they made the full move to iCloud, they shut everything else down to be iCloud. So if you’ve signed up for Apple after September 19, 2012, you are @icloud.com all the way.

The good (or maybe bad news?) is that you can keep using all your accounts. So if you’ve been giving out your @me.com email address for years, you’re still good to do that. If any of your accounts is your email address, you sort of have to keep using it unless you change email addresses. For many, they can delete either their @me or @mac account, depending on which one they still use so it would keep things a bit more tidy.

HOWEVER, if you’re going to use iCloud (for Contacts, Calendar, Photos, Mail, etc) you need to make sure to log in with your @icloud.com account. It will make the Cloud Gods happy.

If all you have is an @icloud.com account, you’re in luck as there’s really nothing to change/do.