Times are changing for email on the Mac. As more people use universally available Web-based services as their primary email accounts, and as POP accounts from Internet providers gather dust, Mac email clients have begun to morph accordingly.
- How Do I Know Who My Email Client Is
- How To Start Outlook As My Email Client
- How Do I Use Gmail For My Email Client On A Mac
At present I use none of the programs you mentioned (the vast majority of my email goes to a 'fake' email address in the form of myfirstname@mylastname.net. From there it gets automagically forwarded to my gmail account, as well a few other rarely used accounts. Set up IMAP and change your SMTP settings to read Gmail messages in other mail clients, like Microsoft Outlook and Apple Mail. When you use IMAP, you can read your Gmail messages on multiple devices, and messages are synced in real time.
The new contenders focus less on powerful cataloging and search capabilities—most webmail accounts handle those tasks quite well already—and more on lightweight, go-anywhere access. The rise of the Mac App Store has made these clients more affordable and more similar to their iOS cousins.
Gmail has a way to help with this, by allowing you to automatically limit the number of emails which will be shown in IMAP (that is, in your Mac or PC or iOS or Android mail client). You can limit it to the most recent 1,000, 2,000, 5,000, or 10,000 messages. Apple Mail is the default email client that comes with every Mac using OS X 10.0 or later. This guide will show you how to configure your Apple Mail application to access email for your Media Temple server. Enter your Gmail details into Apple mail on your iMac, Mac Mini or Macbook. – Open Apple mail, and go to the “Mail’ menubar at the top of the screen and then select ‘Preferences’ from the menu. Not only do you get a feature-packed email account when you sign up for Gmail—you also get an email client that's is very adept at pulling in email from other services and organizing it with a.
Apple’s default Mail client remains firmly in the middle of the road. Its meat-and-potatoes feature set will work fine for most people, and it’s still my default email client—though mostly due to my own inertia.
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If you’re hankering for something different, though, the latest crop of Mac mail clients has you covered. Better features? A sleeker interface? More raw power? Greater simplicity? Whatever you seek, you’ll find it on the App Store, and in this roundup.
Apple Mail 6
Mail 6 sports a small handful of new features, and much of what it does offer owes more to features introduced in Mountain Lion OS X than to anything specific to Mail itself.
Besides improving Safari’s ability to email webpages in various forms, and integrating Mountain Lion’s systemwide notification features, Mail 6 strengthens its predecessor’s already amped-up search powers. The Lion upgrade sharpened Mail’s ability to find messages across multiple mailboxes, but Mountain Lion enhances its ability to find words and phrases within individual messages.
The new VIP feature is more of a snooze. You can add people to or remove them from your roster of special senders only within individual messages, not from a message list itself. And the VIP feature can do little that Smart Mailboxes and mailbox rules couldn’t do already.
That said, Mail remains a dependable, pleasant workhorse of a client. And it’s among the few non-Microsoft mail programs that support Exchange email.
Full Review: Apple Mail 6 ()
Mozilla Thunderbird
If you like building things from scratch, Thunderbird may be your dream come true. This free, open-source client from Mozilla, makers of Firefox, lets you bolt various extensions onto the basic email client—or program your own extensions.
By default, Thunderbird is extremely bare-bones, with a last-decade interface and few of its rivals’ fancier features. Add-ons can help fill it out; but they are spotty and difficult to find, and they tend to favor obscure open-source services over more-popular options. I wasn’t impressed with Thunderbird’s security features, which sometimes didn’t flag dubious messages.
Thunderbird’s search, however, is outstanding, with clever filtering abilities and an appealing interface. I can’t believe that some wily rival hasn’t yet swiped the idea. Unfortunately, that excellent feature isn’t enough to persuade me to recommend Thunderbird as a whole.
Full Review: Mozilla Thunderbird ()
Freron MailMate 1.5
Gray, bland, and humorless, MailMate compensates for its lack of charm with astonishing efficiency and power. Like a trusted accountant, it may not be the life of the party, but it tackles complex jobs with grim relish.
MailMate’s decision to use text-based buttons instead of icons sacrifices visual flair in return for clarity and ease of use. It lacks the ornamentation of most other clients, but offers mind-boggling horsepower under the hood.
MailMate packs the most thorough search abilities I’ve seen in an email client. Sure, Gmail can find names or addresses, and it can add dates to your calendar. But can it sort messages by server domain, or by a prefix in their subject lines? Can it display statistics about your mail, based on these criteria? MailMate can.
I don’t know anyone who has been longing for these features, but I’m sure that such users exist. And for them, this proudly all-business app will be like manna from the email gods.
Full Review: MailMate 1.5 ()
Postbox 3
Postbox starts with Apple Mail’s friendliness and ease of use, and then adds a host of why-didn’t-anyone-else-think-of-that features.
From its poise and polish, you’d never know that Postbox was built on Thunderbird’s framework. I liked its eye-pleasing interface, and especially its superb Inspector pane, which plucks links, dates, addresses, package tracking numbers, and more from the body of your message, and displays them for at-a-glance discovery.
Postbox’s designers have thoughtfully built in ways to tie the program to Gmail, Evernote, Dropbox, and even LinkedIn. And unique among the clients I’ve tested, Postbox lets you save precrafted email responses easily, and then deploy them with a few quick clicks. If you have to send out a lot of form email messages, this feature could spare your hands and wrists some serious repetitive stress.
Microsoft Office users, take note: Postbox does not support Exchange. But otherwise, anyone who has grown weary of Apple Mail's limitations will find Postbox, at just $10, an inexpensive and impressive step up.
Full Review: Postbox 3 ()
Arcode Inky
If you need access to your different email accounts in one place, or if you need a consistent interface in a many locations, try Inky. This beautifully designed, free client stores your account information—but not your message—securely in the cloud.
After you create an Inky account, the program will quickly set up your IMAP- or POP-based mailboxes. (IMAP messages may take a while to show up, but they’ll get there eventually.) Thenceforth, when you log in on that computer or anywhere else, Inky will have all your mail waiting for you.
How Do I Know Who My Email Client Is
The program also recognizes and categorizes different kinds of messages, from daily deals to social media notices, in custom views that you can switch on or off in its settings.
The only drawback of this otherwise sterling program is that Inky will periodically bug you to tell your friends about it. But considering how impressively it performs, you may want to spread the word anyway.
Full Review: Inky ()
Macsimize MailForge 3
Many fans of Eudora, the trusty email client, were crestfallen when Mac OS X Lion shut down support for PowerPC-based programs. Macsimize Software’s MailForge has resurrected Eudora in a new, Mountain Lion-friendly incarnation. Unfortunately, though it may be from the past, it’s anything but a blast.
From its chunky interface—the text formatting icons look disturbingly similar to the ones from the PC version of Microsoft Word—to its lack of modern conveniences (like automatic account setup, inline image display, and threaded messages), MailForge feels like a relic from a late and unlamented decade. It can import mail only from Eudora, and its ungainly search feature leaves much to be desired.
Eudora enthusiasts may see MailForge as the answer to their prayers. But if you lack any very strong nostalgia for the email clients of yore, you’ll find plenty of better and less expensive options out there.
Full Review: Macsimize MailForge 3 ()
Email Pro for Gmail, MailPop Pro for Gmail
These two lightweight Gmail-only clients—think of them as Web browsers that can navigate to only Gmail—offer basic functions at pocket-change prices. Both of them can display Gmail in a simplified mobile view or in a more complex desktop view. And both of them hang out in your menubar, as icons that summon pop-down windows.
To me, Email Pro seemed the better choice. It has a more colorful and intuitive interface, and it explicitly tells you when it is loading messages, instead of just showing a blank window. I also liked its ability to make Gmail my desktop background, persistently hanging out behind my other apps.
The relatively monochromatic MailPop Pro switches between its various views more easily than Email Pro does, and it offers more keyboard shortcuts. But it costs buck more, and has little else to distinguish it. Users who want convenient, no-frills access to Gmail without having to fire up a Web browser might as well stick with Email Pro instead.
Full Review: Email Pro for Gmail ()
Full Review: MailPop Pro for Gmail ()
Sparrow 1.3.1
Google liked this slender, appealing client so much that it bought the entire company. Even though its creators aren’t updating the client anymore, it’s still available on the Mac App Store (use at your own risk, since you won't be able to get much support). And its pleasantly clean and simple interface—strongly reminiscent of Inky, though Sparrow came first—has won the program more than a few fans.
All in all, Sparrow is an attractive choice for anyone who wants a convenient front-end app for Gmail. It won’t bog you down with features you don’t need, nor will it make you feel as if you were using some hastily engineered workaround.
Full Review: Sparrow 1.3.1 ()
Postcards from the future
If these clients don't seem quite right for you, keep your eyes peeled for two new Mac clients that are in development as of this writing.
Mailplane, a Gmail client that adds tighter integration with the Mac OS, is currently in beta for version 3.0. Among other new features, it will incorporate Gmail’s latest interface.
The mysterious Unibox promises “a whole new approach to email on the Mac.” The developer has been teasing prospective users by posting snippets of the client's crisp, swanky interface on its blog. At press time, Unibox’s creators still listed it as “coming in early 2013.”
Mac email users have a wider array of higher-quality, better-looking apps to choose from than ever before. Whatever you need email for, the odds are excellent that you’ll find a well-crafted option that delivers what you want.
No more will you have to depend upon a browser-only interaction with your email account. Let's take a look at these five clients and see if any of them can stand up to your demands. Each of them offers a different feature set; but all of them tackle the most important task – email.
Five apps
1. Geary
Geary is the one Linux-only client on the list. It's written in Vala and intended for seamless integration into the GNOME desktop. It's about as simple as it gets - open it up and use your Gmail account. There are few bells and whistles to this take on the desktop Gmail client. The Geary interface is based on conversations, which makes reading an entire discussion quite simple. Setting up Geary is as simple as adding your Gmail address and password. Once you've done that, Geary will very quickly draw in your email so you can begin reading within seconds. Geary does allow you to mark conversations, add labels, archive emails, view inline and attached images, search, and more. Geary is free and can be installed from source or from your package manager.
2. GMDesk
GMDesk is built upon the Adobe Air runtime environment. Although GMDesk hasn't been in development for quite some time, it still works and works well. With this Air-based application you get access to all of the Gmail features, including Calendar, Drive, and more. Each app will open as a stand-alone application and can be closed as such. There is zero configuration necessary - just enter your Gmail credentials and go. You can also connect GMDesk to your Google Apps account instead of the standard Google services. You can select your preferred start-up service, and even switch between Google services within a single window.
How To Start Outlook As My Email Client
3. eM Client
eM Client offers Gmail synchronization built in. This particular solution is more of a traditional email client. In fact, you might find it similar to that of Outlook - only geared toward Gmail. With eM Client you can work with your email, calendar, tasks, and contacts. You do miss out on Google Drive - but that's not really the purpose of an email client anyway. Em Client also has a built in tool to connect with your colleagues using Gtalk. The one caveat to using eM Client is that, in order to get it for free, you must register. The free license is intended for non-commercial use and does not offer any support. If you want the Pro version, you'll have to shell out $49.95 USD.
Also read:Five email clients to help ease you away from Outlook
4. Gmail by Pokki
Gmail by Pokki is another simple to use desktop app for your Gmail account that offers up friendly notifications from within the Windows system tray. With this free app you can: View and save attachments, set label notifications, create customized tabs, chat, turn any conversation into a video call with up to ten friends, establish a theme, and more. The one thing to be aware of is that Pokki is an entire app store on its own. So when you download Gmail by Pokki, you are installing their app store. It is quite unobtrusive and can be easily avoided. Getting to the settings requires a right-click of the Pokki 'menu' button in the task bar.
5. Thunderbird
Thunderbird is just as capable of dealing with Gmail as any other client. Set up of your Gmail account on Thunderbird is quite simple - no need to know the Gmail server addresses (just create a new account, add your Gmail credentials and let Thunderbird handle the rest. You won't gain access to your Calendar, contacts, tasks, labels, or any of the other Gmail features, but you will have a very powerful email client at your disposal. You can, of course, add the Lightning addon and have it connect to your Gmail Calendar. Thunderbird is a great cross-platform solution (Windows, Linux, Mac) for those looking for a Gmail desktop client.
Bottom line
How Do I Use Gmail For My Email Client On A Mac
If you're looking for user- Gmail-friendly desktop client, look no further than any one of these apps. Although not every app offers the entire range of features as found in the browser-based solution, each of them offers everything you need to access the basics of your Gmail account. Give one of these desktop clients a try and see if it doesn't wean you from your browser.