Not quite true. Hide My Email is included in iCloud+, which is a paid subscription service.

Free for services that use Sign in with Apple. Need iCloud+ for generating addresses outside of that.

Also, 99 cents a month for the cheapest plan isn’t too bad for everything it gives you. If you’re in the iOS/Apple ecosystem, it’s a worthwhile purchase.

iCloud+ is extremely affordable at $1/mo, tho. It's- sort of like free. And you get 50GB storage as part of that $1 plan.

Duckduckgo [0] as well.

[0] https://duckduckgo.com/email/

that leads to a prompt to install a browser addon (for me).. this might be helpful https://duckduckgo.com/email/faq

Apple provides a disposable email? AFAIK it provides a forwarding address, which is similar but distinct from what this is.

Afaik it's bit more complex than a forwarding address as it allows replies from the user behind too (while still being protected) [1][2]

[1] https://developer.apple.com/documentation/sign_in_with_apple...

[2] https://support.apple.com/guide/mail/use-hide-my-email-mlhl4...

It's created automatically (or manually) for any email prompt. It is automatically set for the domain so fill in provides the forward address automatically. You can turn this off and you can delete the forward address anytime you want.

What else would one need from a disposable email?

A disposable email in the form provided by this service, the emails essentially go into a black void. They don't go to your normal inbox like the ones provided by Apple do.

It's a subtle difference.