- Like with most of the open/free software there are robots/bugs floating the net to hack/spam the user on the spot. Software’s generic settings turn ones system into a hacking target. Zimbra / Yahoo customer support didn’t even bother to respond to my emails.
- Some clients are Mac specific though and you will need to find the best Windows alternative of your Mac email client. We decided to put together a list of our favorite Windows alternatives to OS X email clients.
This new email client is called 'Opera Mail' which has been released for Windows and Mac OS. Actually Opera Mail was a part of Opera web browser but Opera has removed it from the browser and has made it available as a separate product. Opera Mail is very simple, clean and light-weight email client. People who like minimal UI in software, will definitely love this new email client program. Its also very customizable. An email program is required if you want to check your email and send messages straight from your desktop. This is a list of the very best free email programs for Windows.
We spent 120 hours testing 16 free email services, narrowing our list to the eight services we believe are the best options. These services have sufficient inbox storage and tools to make it easy to send, receive and store messages.
Gmail is our top pick because it’s the easiest to use and comes with the most services, including access to Google Calendar, an attachment preview, automatic spam filters and direct import of social media contacts into its address book. But there are a number of great options – you'll find our pick of the best free email services below.
Do you need a VPN to protect your email?
Your email account contains a lot of personal information, from details about your work to where you live, who your friends and family are, where you shop and more. If it's hacked, it can quickly lead to serious problems like identity theft, which could have huge financial implications.
The easiest and most secure way to keep your email safe is with a virtual private network service (VPN). These encrypt your emails and help you stay anonymous online – and they're becoming increasingly popular. They’re a particularly good idea if you’re using public Wi-Fi to send emails (at a hotel or cafe, for example) where anybody could read what you're writing if it isn't encrypted.
We think the best VPN service is ExpressVPN. It's fast, offers superb security, and it's very easy to use. But if you're not sure which one is right for you, take a look at our best VPN service guide, where you'll find plenty of advice.
ExpressVPN: Save 49% | $6.67/month (was $12.95/month)
ExpressVPN is the best VPN service there is. It'll keep your email secure, whether you're using a computer, cell phone or tablet – and with this exclusive offer you can get it almost half price, at just $6.67/month. That's fantastic value. (Plus there’s a 30-day money back guarantee if you don't like it.)
ExpressVPN is the best VPN service there is. It'll keep your email secure, whether you're using a computer, cell phone or tablet – and with this exclusive offer you can get it almost half price, at just $6.67/month. That's fantastic value. (Plus there’s a 30-day money back guarantee if you don't like it.)
Best Overall
Gmail
Google Gmail
No inbox ads
Includes a language translator
Attaches one file at a time with the mobile app
Gmail has all the tools and features you need for an email account, including 15GB of inbox storage space, a 100-per-day limit on sent messages, and no inbox ads to interfere with navigating the program. Along with an email address, Gmail also gives you automatic access to many of Google’s other services, such as Drive, Calendar, Maps and Google Plus. You can also use Google Translate within Gmail to translate messages in other languages.
You can attach files up to 25MB and upload more than one at a time. Once they are attached, documents and images are displayed as thumbnails, so it’s easy to verify you’ve attached the correct files. When you receive attachments in an incoming message, these, too, are displayed as thumbnails so you can preview and sure they are safe to download to your computer.
Gmail keeps your inbox safe by automatically identifying and sending spam messages to a spam folder. It also has virus scanning and phishing blocks, so you know the messages you’re getting don’t have hidden threats attached to them.
Gmail keeps your inbox safe by automatically identifying and sending spam messages to a spam folder. It also has virus scanning and phishing blocks, so you know the messages you’re getting don’t have hidden threats attached to them.
Best for Spam Blocking
Yahoo Mail
Yahoo Business mail$1.19
Automatic spam filters
Allows up to 500 sent messages daily
Tricky to navigate
Yahoo Mail takes extra steps to keep your account secure by automatically enabling spam filters and directing messages into the spam folder. It also recognizes some junk mail and will place these items in the trash bin rather than your primary inbox. Another positive feature our testers liked is the sender block, which lets you add an email address to a black list. Rather than redirecting emails from these senders into the spam or trash folders as other email services do, Yahoo Mail blocks these messages entirely.
Yahoo Mail does have a fair number of ads that border your inbox, and some sponsored ads are inserted into the message lists so they look like legitimate emails. These aren’t too difficult to ignore, but they do cause some initial confusion and may make it harder to navigate your inbox.
Yahoo Mail gives you 1 terabyte of inbox storage (enough to hold 20 million email messages) before you must delete some to receive more messages. You also have a daily sent-message limit of 500 emails – five times more than most free email services allow, but less than Gmail. The Yahoo Mail app is also easy to use, with the same features available as the online account.
Yahoo Mail gives you 1 terabyte of inbox storage (enough to hold 20 million email messages) before you must delete some to receive more messages. You also have a daily sent-message limit of 500 emails – five times more than most free email services allow, but less than Gmail. The Yahoo Mail app is also easy to use, with the same features available as the online account.
Best for Email Encryption
ProtonMail
Proton Mail Plus$4
Proton Mail Professional$6.25
Proton Mail Visionary$24
Encrypts outgoing messages
25MB maximum attachment size
If you reset your password, you’ll lose access to previous messages
ProtonMail is a basic email service that is easy to set up because it doesn’t ask for any personal information. You just pick a user name and password, and you’re set. Be aware that some features – such as mail collection and the ability to sync across multiple devices – are only available with its paid email service. But the free version does have email encryption, which is important if you send messages with sensitive information you want to protect. ProtonMail automatically unencrypts the message when it reaches the recipient’s inbox and is opened.
To further protect your messages, ProtonMail has a secure password recovery process. Although you can reset your password if you forget your old one, ProtonMail won’t allow access to the messages you received in your inbox or saved in folders before you reset your password. This means you will lose all emails, both sent and received.
ProtonMail lets you attach multiple files at once to outgoing messages, up to the maximum attachment size of 25MB. Once they’re attached, you can’t preview the files without downloading and opening them again. You also have only 500MB of inbox storage, which is enough to hold about 1,200 messages.
ProtonMail lets you attach multiple files at once to outgoing messages, up to the maximum attachment size of 25MB. Once they’re attached, you can’t preview the files without downloading and opening them again. You also have only 500MB of inbox storage, which is enough to hold about 1,200 messages.
Best Email for Mac
iCloud Mail
Requires a lot of steps to set up
iCloud Mail is the official email service from Apple and is designed to be accessed easily from any Mac computer or mobile device, though you can send and read messages from Windows computers, too.
We learned that it takes a lot of steps to set up and verify an iCloud account and it isn’t easy. But the email program itself is impressive as it automatically saves contact information to your contact folder as messages are opened or sent. You can create alias email accounts and view them all in a single inbox and write automated reply messages for when you can’t return messages right away. We were really impressed with how fast our images and documents attached to outgoing messages using iCloud Mail, much faster than most services we tested. But you can’t preview these files once they’ve been attached.
Best for Home Businesses
Zoho Mail
Zoho Standard$1
Zoho Standard$2
Zoho Pro$5
Collects messages from other email accounts
Zoho Mail is part of a group of free services from Zoho that are designed for small businesses, especially if you have a home-based business or are a sole proprietor.
Programs include a calendar, contact manager, expense tracker and project reports that all sync together so you can see and manage your entire business from your email inbox. When you send or receive any messages from clients, Zoho Mail automatically makes a note of it in the CRM. And it will remind you of meetings or follow-up messages you need to send after checking the Zoho Calendar. One good feature is you can redirect email from other email services into your inbox so you don’t have to check messages in each individual account. And because Zoho has unlimited inbox storage, you won’t have to worry about running out of space. One feature the service doesn’t include is the ability to import contacts from social media sites, so you’ll have to manually enter each one. Or you can import them into either the Zoho ContactManager or Zoho CRM that will sync with your inbox and give you access to this information.
Why Trust Us?
While Top Ten Reviews has been evaluating free email services for 12 years, our testers have been familiar with email programs for much longer. To update our recommendations, we spent 120 hours using and testing 16 free email services.
One tester used an 18-year-old free email account (originally a Hotmail account, now an Outlook account), along with other free accounts, to help us compare the features and services of email providers.
Fl studio similar program for mac. We narrowed the 16 free email services to eight that we believe are the best options. We eliminated services that allow you to send free email messages but won’t let you receive messages without purchasing the service. We also discounted services that currently have free email accounts available but are either no longer offering support or have plans to discontinue them. We didn’t feel comfortable recommending a service that may not be around long term.
How We Tested
To test free email services, we performed common tasks with each service and took note of the ease or difficulty. For example, we noted how many steps it took to set up a new account, the amount of personal information required and whether we needed to provide a cellphone number to verify and officially activate the account.
We followed a similar process to test the tools for attaching files and images to outgoing emails. We recorded the number of steps it took to attach a file, whether we could attach multiple files at once, and how long the program took to upload attachments to our message.
Since each of the free email services we tested has a mobile app, we tested how easy it was to set up and access email accounts this way, too. Again, we tracked the steps and made note of any challenges in attaching images and files to messages via the app. We also determined whether any functions from the desktop version were missing in the app.
Can I Have 2 Gmail Accounts?
Yes you can! Many people have multiple Gmail accounts, each with its own email address. Each free Gmail account comes with 15GB of inbox storage space, enough to hold around 300,000 messages before you have to start deleting some to make room for incoming email. You can always choose to convert to a paid email account and get unlimited storage.
Gmail lets you log into multiple email accounts at once and simply toggle between them without having to log out and re-enter your credentials each time. We found this to be a very helpful perk especially if you have a personal Gmail account and another dedicated to your work or home business. This multi-account feature works on mobile, too, so you’re always connected and can quickly access important email while on the go. It’s hard to attach files to outgoing messages using the Gmail app, though, since it only allows you to upload one file at a time.
How Much Can I Expect to Pay for a Premium Email Account?
Email services typically charge between $2 and $10 per month for their paid services, depending on how much mail you need to send and receive. The biggest differences between free and paid email services is the size of the files you’re allowed to attach to outgoing mail, how many emails you can send per day, how much backup and inbox space you’re given, and the level of customer support you can access. Most free email services give you enough inbox and online backup space combined to hold hundreds of thousands of emails, but they typically limit the number of email messages you can send in a day to about 100. This is plenty for most people using an email account for personal use. But if you have a home business or know a lot of people you need to email every day, then it may be worth purchasing an email account with unlimited outbound messaging.
What to Look For When Choosing a Free Email Service
Inbox and Folders
Nearly all free email services have inbox ads, so there’s that most services include. Since they’re all but unavoidable, look for services that make them less obtrusive. Some place ads to the side, so they don’t create too much distraction. However, some services place ads all around the inbox, making it difficult to navigate the program. Some free email services even allow pop-up ads that cover your inbox and require you to click out of them to access your messages.
Nearly all free email services have inbox ads, so there’s that most services include. Since they’re all but unavoidable, look for services that make them less obtrusive. Some place ads to the side, so they don’t create too much distraction. However, some services place ads all around the inbox, making it difficult to navigate the program. Some free email services even allow pop-up ads that cover your inbox and require you to click out of them to access your messages.
Pay attention to the amount of inbox storage available, because once you reach the cap, you’ll have to start deleting messages in order to receive more. Many free email services offer a terabyte or even unlimited storage, which is helpful if you tend to receive messages with large attachments, like image and video files. However, even a few gigabytes of storage gives you enough space to hold between 100,000 and 300,000 messages.
Free email services do cap the number of email messages you can send out per day. This is to cut down on spam messages sent with their services. The cap is generally around 100 messages per day, which is sufficient for keeping in touch with family or other personal email uses. But if you need an email service for business purposes, it may be better to purchase an email service that permits unlimited messages each day.
Composition Tools
It’s easy to write and send email messages with any service once you figure out where the New Message and Send buttons are. It’s more important to examine the attachment features, including the maximum file size you can send and whether you can preview files once they are attached.
It’s easy to write and send email messages with any service once you figure out where the New Message and Send buttons are. It’s more important to examine the attachment features, including the maximum file size you can send and whether you can preview files once they are attached.
During testing, we looked at the maximum size allowed for attached files. Most of the accounts we tested can handle between 20MB and 25MB, which is about six professional images or 10 snapshots taken with a point-and-shoot camera. It was also important for us to see a thumbnail of the file once we uploaded it, so that we could confirm we had attached the correct one.
Securing Your Email
According to Mitch Stephens, a security consultant for Emagined Security, email attacks are the most common internet threat. “An attacker can send a link that looks similar to another link you are familiar with,” Stephens told us, and when you open it, you’ll see a site that looks legitimate and asks for your login information. Once you enter it, the attacker then has your credentials to log into the real site and gather even more personal information. These are known as phishing schemes, or phishing attacks.
According to Mitch Stephens, a security consultant for Emagined Security, email attacks are the most common internet threat. “An attacker can send a link that looks similar to another link you are familiar with,” Stephens told us, and when you open it, you’ll see a site that looks legitimate and asks for your login information. Once you enter it, the attacker then has your credentials to log into the real site and gather even more personal information. These are known as phishing schemes, or phishing attacks.
“The best way to protect yourself from phishing attacks is by only opening email from trusted or known sources,” said Stephens.
You can also install internet security programs to your computer that include antiphishing tools to help block these schemes from getting into your inbox to begin with. We’ve tested many internet security programs and recommend Bitdefender Internet Security and McAfee LiveSafe, which both come with antiphishing tools.
Email Safety Practices: How to Spot a Scam Email
If you have a landline, cell phone or email, you’ve undoubtedly received shady phone calls or messages. Scammers use shock and fear tactics to try to get you to quickly send money or give up personal information. In one of the most common scams, someone contacts you pretending to be from the IRS. In response, the IRS has released an article identifying the five tell-tale signs of an IRS scam. You should never give your personal information over the phone or through email.
If you receive an email or call from someone claiming your computer is out of date, be very wary. If they further ask you for your personal information, Wi-Fi information or IP address, you’ll know for certain it’s a scam. They’re simply trying to steal your identity or hack your computer. If you’re uncertain, contact the actual company they claim to represent to see if there is anything wrong with your accounts.
Further Ways to Spot a Scam Email:
- If they try to pressure you into giving personal or credit card info, it’s a scam.
- Look at the sender’s email address. If the name is a near misspelling of an established company, it’s a scam. (i.e. “Chase Bnk” instead of “Chase Bank”)
- If there are a lot of grammatical errors and fractured sentences, the email most likely wasn’t sent from an official company.
- Prize winner emails are always scams unless you specifically remember signing up for something. Even then, it could still be a scam.
- If they sidestep your questions and pummel you with threats and fears, it’s a scam.
To better protect yourself, consider purchasing eScan, an anti-virus software that recognizes spam messages that are specifically tailored to you.
More Internet Guides:
Best OverallGmail
Gmail is the easiest email service to use and the only one that doesn’t include inbox ads. It has all the features the best service should, such as mail collection, auto reply and spam filters.
Free Email Program For My Computer
Best for Spam BlockingYahoo Mail
Yahoo Mail lets you add email addresses to a block list so that messages from these senders never make it into any folder in your account, including the trash and spam folders.
Best for Email Encryption ProtonMail
ProtonMail encrypts all outgoing messages so they can’t be read by anyone except the receiver once it reaches their inbox.
Product | Price | Overall Rating | Inbox & Folder Settings | Composition Tools | Security Tools & Filters | Conveniences | Help & Support | Ease of Use | Daily Message Limit | Mail Collector | Mobile Service | IMAP Support | Inbox Storage | Message Translator | Import Social Media Contacts | Aliases | Spam Filters | Suspicious Account Activity Alert | Secure Sign-In | Phishing Blocks | Virus Scanning | View Attachments | Average Upload Time | Multiple Image Upload | Auto Reply | Conversation View | Max Attachment Size | Pop-Out Window | Standout Feature | Task Calendar | Custom Themes | Video Chat | Chat/Instant Messaging | FAQ | Email Support | Forums |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Gmail | View Deal | 5/5 | 10 | 9.8 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 100% | 100 | ✓ | 80% | ✓ | 15GB | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | Automatic | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 16.5 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 25MB | ✓ | Message Translator | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Yahoo Mail | View Deal | 5/5 | 10 | 9.8 | 10 | 8.8 | 10 | 85% | 500 | ✓ | 95% | ✓ | 1TB | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | Automatic | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 4 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 25MB | ✓ | Block Sender | ✓ | ✓ | - | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Outlook | View Deal | 4.5/5 | 9.8 | 10 | 7.8 | 10 | 10 | 80% | 100 | ✓ | 100% | ✓ | 1TB | * | ✓ | ✓ | Manual | - | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 4 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 50MB | ✓ | 50MB Attachment Limit | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
AOL Mail | View Deal | 4.5/5 | 7.8 | 10 | 9.8 | 8.8 | 10 | 90% | 200 | ✓ | 75% | ✓ | Unlimited | - | - | - | Manual | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | .5 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 25MB | ✓ | Fast Load Time | ✓ | ✓ | - | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
GMX | View Deal | 4.5/5 | 9 | 10 | 7.8 | 10 | 9.5 | 90% | Undisclosed | ✓ | 90% | ✓ | Unlimited | - | ✓ | ✓ | Manual | - | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 4 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 50MB | ✓ | Unlimited Inbox Storage | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Zoho Mail | View Deal | 4.5/5 | 8.8 | 9.8 | 7.8 | 10 | 10 | 95% | 250 | ✓ | 90% | ✓ | Unlimited | - | - | ✓ | Manual | - | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | .5 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 20MB | ✓ | Mail Collecting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
iCloud | View Deal | 4/5 | 8.5 | 9.8 | 5.8 | 6.3 | 5.8 | 90% | 1000 | ✓ | 75% | ✓ | 5 GB | - | - | ✓ | Manual | - | ✓ | - | ✓ | ✓ | 2 sec | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | 20MB | ✓ | Mac Compatible | ✓ | - | - | - | ✓ | - | - |
ProtonMail | View Deal | 3.5/5 | 7.8 | 7 | 5.8 | 5 | 6.8 | 90% | 150 | $ | 70% | $ | 500MB | - | - | $ | Manual | - | ✓ | - | ✓ | - | 2.5 sec | ✓ | - | ✓ | 25MB | ✓ | Message Encryption | - | ✓ | - | - | ✓ | ✓ | - |
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A recent surge of worthy new email clients offers Mac users some of the best choices they’ve ever had for managing their mail. With a panoply of clever features and new ideas, these contenders have also mounted a serious challenge to the relatively stagnant Apple Mail and Microsoft Outlook. But with so may options to choose from, it’s now even harder to pick out the best email client for your particular needs. We’ve found one strong program that offers a great mix of features, usability, and value for a broad swath of users, plus several more that will cater well to more specialized preferences.
Top choice: Postbox 3
Postbox 3 () isn’t the newest or sleekest candidate in this roundup. Its design hews more closely to the traditional Mac look and feel, rather than adopting a slick iOS-like appearance. But for $10, it combines reliable performance, smart design, and a wide array of impressive features that make the program feel like what Apple Mail ought to be.
Even though it’s built on Mozilla’s aging Thunderbird underpinnings, Postbox handled my email quickly and confidently. Setting up new POP and IMAP accounts went smoothly; in one case, when I tried to set up a work Outlook account, Postbox patiently guessed at several different IMAP configurations until it found the right one. It then filled up my new mailbox relatively quickly, despite the pile of messages involved, and let me track its progress with a clear but unobtrusive progress icon.
Paint program for mac os x. Everywhere you turn in Postbox, you’ll find well-thought-out features that enhance your email experience. Message threads are easy to follow, with each message’s beginning and end clearly marked, and a quick reply box waiting at the end of the most recent message.
An inspector pane next to each message shows you not only who sent it —and, with a click, their entire contact card from your address book—but breaks out any links, images, maps, or package delivery info it finds in the message. You can also easily search for any messages, images, or attachments from a particular sender just by clicking links within their address book info.
And if work requires you to send a lot of form responses, Postbox builds in that ability. Just compose your response in preferences, then choose it from a pulldown menu when you’re writing a new email.
Postbox plays nicely with many popular social and productivity tools. If you have Evernote installed, Postbox can send emails to that service to help you keep track of them. Once you set up your account information, dragging and dropping files from your Dropbox will create links that let recipients download those files straight from your Dropbox account. And you can tie in your Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn accounts to not only get links to your contacts on those services, but post to all three directly from Postbox. The program will even use the Gravatar service to pull in images for your friends and acquaintances from one or more of those services.
A helpful To-Do mode lets you create new tasks, or turn existing messages into tasks, then check them off as you finish. Postbox also integrates an RSS reader to keep track of your favorite feeds, an increasingly rare feature among modern email clients. And Postbox provides great support for Gmail, including the ability to use Gmail’s keyboard shortcuts. None of these features gets in the way of simply sending or receiving email, but they’re all readily available when you need them.
Finding and using all these features can get a bit intimidating when you first start using it, but Postbox’s clear, straightforward, and easily searchable online help files make the learning curve much gentler.
Postbox 3 has begun to show its age; OS X updates since its initial release have actually broken a few features, such as integration with the Mac’s Calendar. But overall, Postbox seems like the best mix of price, capabilities, and quality for the majority of Mac users.
Top contenders
Inky
Best Free Email Program For Linux
If you use email more for pleasure than business, you’ll likely enjoy Inky’s earnest efforts to present your inbox in ways that matter to you.
Built for portability, Inky () stores information for your POP and IMAP accounts—but not your mail itself—securely on its remote servers. Once you’ve set up that info, a single Inky login will bring all your email to any computer you’re using Inky with.
In a clean, colorful interface, Inky lets you view mail as a unified inbox, by individual accounts, or by several different clever Smart Views. The program’s smart enough to automatically recognize and sort messages containing maps, package info, daily deals, subscription mailings, and other common categories.
By clicking icons on each message, you can also teach Inky how to rank your email by relevance, so that it’ll display messages that matter to you more prominently.
I occasionally had trouble logging in to Inky, and had to quit and restart the program a few times to get to my mail. And Inky doesn’t offer business-friendly features like to-do lists, or any bells and whistles beyond sorting and handling email. But it’s free, it’s fun to use, and it’s full of well-executed and practical new ideas.
Mail Pilot
The same can be said for Mail Pilot (; Mac App Store link), a $20 email client built loosely around the Getting Things Done approach to productivity. It looks terrific, but for all its good qualities, it’s still missing a few crucial features.
Mail Pilot treats your inbox as a to-do list. Each message is a task that you can check off right away, set aside until you’ve got the time for it, or ask to be reminded about on a certain date. Clearly labeled keyboard shortcuts at the bottom of the screen make these tasks easy to accomplish.
It’s IMAP-only, and setting up your account ranges from simple (Gmail) to tricky (Outlook, although the program’s great help files spelled out exactly what I needed.) Once your mail’s in place, Mail Pilot offers lots of different options to navigate message threads. The variety puzzled me at first, but I came to appreciate the different ways it sorted and stacked my messages.
As a fairly new program, Mail Pilot’s still somewhat under construction. The ability to save new messages as drafts or search by message text won’t arrive until a later version. But if you’re in synch with Mail Pilot’s productivity-first approach, you’ll nonetheless find the program helpful and worthwhile.
Unibox
Give it a few more versions, and Unibox (; Mac App Store link) could become quite the contender. Right now, it’s a very well-designed and usable $10 app with a few pesky hiccups.
Setting up IMAP accounts is fast and easy, and once your mailboxes are populated, Unibox displays them not by message title, but by who sent you mail on a given day. From the top of the screen, you can switch between viewing each sender’s message thread, or seeing all the attachments or images in that thread by list or by icon.
I really enjoyed Unibox’s sleek and efficient one-window interface, which makes maximum use of space while still displaying your mail clearly. The new message window slides down from the top of each message thread. Buttons to sort, junk, or delete a message materialize when your mouse hovers to the left of it; replying and forwarding options appear when you hover to the right.
I wasn’t as fond of the blank screen Unibox displayed upon loading until I manually refreshed my mail. And it has a bad habit of truncating longer messages by default, forcing you to click again to read the whole thing. Still, it’s a smart program full of good ideas; it just needs a bit more polish.
The rest of the pack
AirMail
AirMail () offers an attractive, inexpensive front end for your IMAP-based webmail of choice. But while the program’s interface is nice to look at, it’s not always easy to use, with tiny, hard-to-see buttons and space-hogging new message windows. Gmail messages also take an unusually long time to load; promised Dropbox support proved impossible to set up; and AirMail offers few help features.
Mail.app
I used to love Apple Mail () but it’s begun to stagnate with the last few versions of OS X (Mail is free with OS X Mavericks). The latest incarnation trickles in a few new features, including the welcome ability to search by attachments and attachment types. And, as befits an Apple program, it’s well-integrated with the rest of OS X. It’s also the only client in this review to natively support Microsoft Exchange accounts, although Outlook’s increasing support for IMAP renders that a bit moot.
Alas, the latest version was plagued by troubles with Gmail, and Apple has released updates that address many of the problems. But wouldn't it be nice if it simply just worked?
MailMate
Like a mighty rhinoceros, the $30 MailMate () won’t win any beauty contests; it’s not what you’d call “approachable”; and it’s astonishingly powerful. Its gray, austere, text-only interface conceals jaw-dropping abilities to search, sort, and sift massive piles of mail. Its support for SpamSieve and PGP, and its unbelievably granular search categories—like “level of server domain”—make MailMate the undisputed best email pick for power users, but probably a needlessly intimidating choice for everyday users.
See a list of email clients available for the Mac
Bottom line
Even if you only want a simple, no-frills email experience, you don’t have to stick with Apple Mail. Inky’s a great free alternative for folks who just want a streamlined inbox presented in a friendly way. On the other end of the spectrum, MailMate is ideal for tech-savvy experienced users who want to rule their inbox like a cruel, all-powerful god. And right at the happy medium between those extremes, Postbox offers plenty of easy-to-use enhancements for a fair price.
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details.
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