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Comparison of email clients

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The following tables compare general and technical features of a number of email client programs. Please see the individual products' articles for further information.

General[edit]

Basic general information about the clients: creator/company, licence/price etc. Clients listed on a light purple background are no longer in active development.

Client Creator Operating system Cost Software license User Interface
AfterLogic WebMail Lite afterlogic.org Cross-platform Free AGPL Web
Alpine University of Washington Cross-platform Free Apache License TUI
Atmail Atmail.com Linux From $199 – 10 users proprietary GUI
Balsa Stuart Parmenter Linux Free GNU GPL GUI
Becky! Internet Mail Rimarts Windows $40 proprietary GUI
BlitzMail Dartmouth College Free BSD GUI
Citadel citadel.org Unix-like Free GNU GPL Web
Claws Mail the Claws Mail team Cross-platform Free GNU GPL GUI
Cone Courier Mail Server developers Unix-like Free GNU GPL TUI
Courier (formerly Calypso) Micro Computer Systems, Inc., continued by Rose City Software Windows discontinued proprietary GUI
Elm Dave D. Taylor, Sydney Weinstein, Bill Pemberton, Michael Elkins, Kari Hurtta Unix-like Free Elm Mail System GPL TUI
eM Client eM Client Inc. Windows Free or Pro version ($49.95) proprietary GUI
EmailTray Internet Promotion Agency S.A. Windows, Android Free; Paid version starts at $14.95 per year proprietary GUI
Eudora Qualcomm Windows, Mac OS X Free Led to Eudora OSE, a free and open source Mozilla Thunderbird extension, which ceased 2010. GUI
Eureka Email Sean O'Connor Windows Shareware (no time limit), $20 full version proprietary GUI
Evolution The GNOME Project Cross-platform Free GNU GPL GUI
FirstClass Open Text Free proprietary GUI
Forté Agent Mark Sidell Windows $29 Includes a free 3-month Agent Premium News account, Free 30 day trial proprietary GUI
GNUMail Ludovic Marcotte and others Mac OS X, Linux Free GNU GPL GUI
Gnus Gnus team Cross-platform Free GNU GPL TUI and GUI
GroupWise Novell Cross-platform Included with GroupWise mailbox license proprietary GUI
i.Scribe, InScribe Memecode Windows, Mac OS X, Linux Free (i.Scribe), $20 (InScribe) proprietary GUI
IBM Notes (formerly IBM Lotus Notes) IBM Collaboration Solutions (formerly Lotus Software), IBM Windows, Mac OS X, Linux $108, includes 1 yr phone support US Prices in IBM Passport Advantage proprietary GUI (Notes) and Web (iNotes)
IMP Horde LLC Cross-platform Free GNU GPL Web
Inky Dave Baggett, Arcode Corporation Windows, Mac OS X, Free proprietary GUI
KMail KDE Cross-platform Free, part of KDE Applications GNU GPL GUI
Mail Apple Inc. Mac OS X and iOS Part of Mac OS X and iOS proprietary GUI
Mailbird Mailbird Windows Free proprietary GUI
mailx ? Unix-like Free ? TUI
Microsoft Entourage Microsoft Mac OS X Part of Microsoft Office for Mac proprietary GUI
Microsoft Outlook Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X Part of Microsoft Office, $109.99 stand-alone proprietary GUI
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups Mozilla Foundation Free, part of Mozilla Application Suite MPL, GNU GPL, GNU LGPL tri-license GUI
Mozilla Thunderbird Mozilla Foundation Cross-platform Free MPL GUI
Mulberry Cyrus Daboo (formerly Cyrusoft International, Inc./ISAMET) Cross-platform Free, as of version 4.0.5 Apache License GUI
Mutt Michael Elkins Cross-platform Free GNU GPL TUI
Netscape Messenger Netscape Communications Free  ? GUI
Netscape Messenger 9 Netscape Communications Free MPL, GNU GPL, GNU LGPL tri-license GUI
nmh / MH RAND Corporation Unix-like Free BSD CLI
Opera Mail Opera Software Cross-platform Free proprietary GUI
Outlook Express Microsoft Windows Free proprietary GUI
Pegasus Mail David Harris Windows Donationware proprietary GUI
Pine University of Washington Cross-platform Free Pine License TUI
Pocomail Poco Systems Windows discontinued proprietary GUI
RoundCube The RoundCube Team Cross-platform Free GNU GPL Web
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups SeaMonkey Council Cross-platform Free, part of SeaMonkey MPL GUI
Spicebird Synovel Windows, Linux, BSD discontinued MPL, GNU GPL, GNU LGPL tri-license GUI
SquirrelMail The SquirrelMail Project Team Cross-platform Free GNU GPL v2 Web
Sylpheed Hiroyuki Yamamoto Cross-platform Free GNU GPL, GNU LGPL GUI
The Bat! RitLabs Windows $35 (Home Edition), $45 (Professional Edition) proprietary GUI
Trojitá KDE Cross-platform Free GNU GPL GUI
Turnpike Thus PLC (Demon Internet) Windows Free for Demon customers, GB£199 inc. VAT otherwise proprietary GUI
Windows Live Mail Microsoft Windows Free proprietary GUI
Windows Mail Microsoft Windows Part of Windows Vista proprietary GUI
WorldClient Alt-N Technologies Windows Part of MDaemon proprietary GUI
YAM YAM Open Source Team and contributing authors AmigaOS Free GNU GPL GUI
Zimbra Zimbra Cross-platform Free MPL on server and ZPL (attribution clause) on client GUI
Client Creator Operating system Cost Software license User interface

Release history[edit]

A brief digest of the release histories.

Client First public release First stable release Latest stable release
Date Version Date Version
Alpine November 2006 0.8 December 2007 1.00 2.11 (August 13, 2013; 6 months ago (2013-08-13)) [±]
Atmail January 30, 2001 0.8 January 12, 2012 6.3.5 7.2.1 (February 14, 2014; 12 days ago (2014-02-14)) [±]
Becky! Internet Mail 1996 1 ? ? 2.65.05 (November 8, 2013; 3 months ago (2013-11-08)) [±]
Citadel 1987 ? 1988 1.00 8.24 (January 27, 2014; 30 days ago (2014-01-27)) [±]
Claws Mail May 2001 0.4.67 January 2005 1.0.0 3.9.3 (December 14, 2013; 2 months ago (2013-12-14)) [±]
Cone May 2003 0.50 May 2003 0.50 0.90 (April 29, 2012; 21 months ago (2012-04-29)) [±]
Courier June, 2004 3.5 discontinued discontinued discontinued
Elm 1986 ? March 1987 2 2.5.8 (August 18, 2005; 8 years ago (2005-08-18)) [±]
eM Client November 2007 1.0 November 2007 1.0 6.0.19861.0 (January 28, 2014; 29 days ago (2014-01-28)) [±]
EmailTray October 2010 2.0 March 2011 3.11 4.0 (July 2, 2012; 19 months ago (2012-07-02)) [±]
Eudora 1988[1] ? 1988[1] ? 7.1 (Windows), 6.2.4 (Mac OS) (October 11, 2006; 7 years ago (2006-10-11)) [±]
Eureka Email November 2002 1.0 November 2002 1.0 2.2 (March 1, 2005; 8 years ago (2005-03-01)) [±]
Evolution 11 May 2000 0.0 3 December 2001 1.0 3.10 (26 September 2013; 4 months ago (2013-09-26)) [±][2]


Forté Agent ? ? ? ? 7.2 (August 29, 2013; 5 months ago (2013-08-29)) [±]
Gnus 1987[3] ? February 1, 1988[3] 2.0 Gnus improvements are now released as part of Emacs. [±]
GroupWise ? ? 1986 1.0 GroupWise 2012 SP2
(April 16, 2013; 10 months ago (2013-04-16)) [±]
i.Scribe / InScribe 1999 1.00 ? ? 1.90 (August 25, 2008; 5 years ago (2008-08-25)) [±]
IBM Lotus Notes 1989 1.0 1989 1.0 9.0 (March 14, 2013; 11 months ago (2013-03-14)) [±]
IMP ? ? 1998 1.0 H4 (5.0.23) (July 21, 2012; 18 months ago (2012-07-21)) [±]
KMail October 1998 Alpha February 1999 1.0.17 4.12.2 (4 February 2014; 22 days ago (2014-02-04)) [±][4]
Mail September 13, 2000 Public Beta March 24, 2001 1.0 7.0 (October 22, 2013; 4 months ago (2013-10-22)) [±]
Mailbird April 1, 2013 Public Beta ? ? ?
Microsoft Entourage ? ? ? ? 2008 (12.3.3) (May 8, 2012; 21 months ago (2012-05-08)) [±]
Microsoft Office Outlook 1997 97 1997 97 14.0.4760.1000 (June 15, 2010; 3 years ago (2010-06-15)) [±]
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups December 7, 1998 "Preview" March 19, 1999 M3 discontinued
Mozilla Thunderbird July 28, 2003 0.1 December 7, 2004 1.0 24.3.0 (February 4, 2014; 22 days ago (2014-02-04)[5]) [±]
Mulberry September 20, 1996 1.0 September 20, 1996 1.0 4.0.8 (February 21, 2007; 7 years ago (2007-02-21)) [±]
Mutt 1995 ? ? ? 1.4.2.3 (June 9, 2007; 6 years ago (2007-06-09)) [±]
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? discontinued
Netscape Messenger 9 November 15, 2007 9.0a1 discontinued discontinued discontinued
nmh / MH 1979 ? ? ? 1.5 (June 11, 2012; 20 months ago (2012-06-11)) [±]
Opera Mail September 1996 2.1b1 December 1996 2.1 1.0 (June 11, 2013; 8 months ago (2013-06-11)[6]) [±]
Outlook Express 1996 3.0 ? ? 6.0 SP2 (August 25, 2004; 9 years ago (2004-08-25)) [±]
Pegasus Mail 1990 ? 1990 ? 4.63 (January 1, 2012; 2 years ago (2012-01-01)) [±]
Pine January 15, 1992 2.00 January 15, 1992 2.00 4.64 (September 28, 2005; 8 years ago (2005-09-28)) [±]
Pocomail 1999 ? ? ? 4.8 build 4400 (April 6, 2009; 4 years ago (2009-04-06)) [±]
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups September 15, 2005 1.0a January 30, 2006 1.0 2.24 (February 6, 2014; 20 days ago (2014-02-06)[7]) [±]
SquirrelMail December 1999 0.1 January 2001 1.0 1.4.22 (July 12, 2011; 2 years ago (2011-07-12)) [±]
Sylpheed January 2000 0.1.0 December 2004 1.0.0 3.3.0 (November 9, 2012; 15 months ago (2012-11-09)) [±]
The Bat! March 1997 1.0 Beta March 1998 1.00 Build 1310 6.2 (December 31, 2013; 57 days ago (2013-12-31)) [±]
Trojitá August 2009 0.1 December 2012 0.3.90 0.3.96 (September 30, 2013; 4 months ago (2013-09-30)) [±]
Turnpike circa 1996 1.0 circa 1996 1.0 6.06 (May 23, 2006; 7 years ago (2006-05-23)) [±]
Windows Live Mail ? ? ? ? 2012 (v16.4.3522.0110) (February 20, 2014; 6 days ago (2014-02-20)) [±]
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ?
YAM 1995 1.0 1995 1.0 2.8 (December 24, 2012; 13 months ago (2012-12-24)) [±]
Zimbra November, 2005 Beta March, 2006 3.5 7.2.0 (April 10, 2012; 22 months ago (2012-04-10)) [±]
Client Date Version Date Version Latest stable release
First public release First stable release

Operating system support[edit]

The operating systems on which the clients can run natively (without emulation).

Client Microsoft Windows Mac OS X Linux BSD Unix DOS Other
Alpine Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Atmail No No Yes Yes Yes No No
Balsa No No Yes Yes No No No
Becky! Internet Mail Yes No No No No No No
Citadel No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Claws Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Cone No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Courier Yes No No No No No No
Elm No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
eM Client Yes No No No No No No
EmailTray Yes No No No No No No
Eudora Yes Yes No No No No No
Eureka Email Yes No No No No No No
Evolution Beta No Yes Yes Yes No No
Forté Agent Yes No No No No No No
Gnus Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Emacs
GroupWise Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes Yes Yes No No No No
IBM Lotus Notes Yes Yes Yes No No No No
IMP Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
KMail No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Mail No Included No No No No iOS
Mailbird Yes No No No No No No
mailx No No Yes Yes Yes No No
Microsoft Entourage No Terminated (2008) No No No No No
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes Yes No No No No No
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups Terminated (1.7.13) No No
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Mulberry Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Mutt Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes[8] No
Netscape Messenger Terminated (4.80) No No
Netscape Messenger 9 Terminated (9.0a1) No No
nmh / MH No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Opera Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes ? No No
Outlook Express Included (up to XP) No No No No No No
Pegasus Mail Yes No No No No Yes No
Pine Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Terminated (3.96)[9] No
Pocomail Yes No No No No No No
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Spicebird Yes planned Yes Yes No No No
SquirrelMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Sylpheed Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
The Bat! Yes No No No No No No
Trojitá Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No MeeGo
Turnpike Yes No No No No No No
Windows Live Mail Yes No No No No No No
Windows Mail Included (Vista) No No No No No No
YAM No No No No No No AmigaOS
Zimbra Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Client Microsoft Windows Mac OS X Linux BSD Unix DOS Other

Protocol support[edit]

Communication and access protocol support[edit]

What email and related protocols and standards are supported by each client.

Client POP3
fetch all messages		 POP3
selected by filter		 POP3
selected by user		 IMAP4
 SMTP
 NNTP
 LDAP v2
 LDAP v3
 EWS IPv6 MAPI
Alpine Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ?
Atmail No No No Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 1] Yes ? ? ? ?
Citadel Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ?
Cone Yes No No [Note 2] Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
Courier Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? ? ?
Elm No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes No No Yes Yes No No No No No Yes
EmailTray Yes No No Yes Yes No No No No No No
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
Gnus Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
GroupWise Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes No Yes Yes Yes No Yes [Note 3] Yes [Note 3] No No Yes
IBM Notes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No
KMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No [Note 4] Yes ? ? ? ?
Mail Yes No No Yes Yes No Yes ? Yes ? ?
Mailbird Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes ?
Microsoft Entourage Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes No Yes Partial ? ?
Microsoft Entourage 2008, Web Services Edition Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ?
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes No No Yes Yes No Yes ? ? Yes Yes
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Partial Partial[10] extensible[11] Yes ?
Mulberry Yes No No Yes Yes No Yes ? ? Yes Yes
Mutt Yes No (possible with POP3 browser) No (possible with POP3 browser) Yes Yes No (slrn looks alike) Partial (resolve real names through NSS) ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH Yes ? ? No Yes ? ? ? No ? No
Opera Mail Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No ? Yes Yes
Outlook Express Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ?
Pegasus Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 5] Yes ? ? ? ?
Pine Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ?
Pocomail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Partial ? ? Yes ?
Spicebird Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Partial ? ? ? ?
SquirrelMail Yes No No Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? ? ?
Sylpheed Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No
The Bat! Yes Yes [Note 6] Yes [Note 7] Yes Yes Yes [Note 8] Yes No ? Yes Yes
Trojitá No No No Yes Yes No No No No Yes No
Turnpike Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ?
Windows Mail Yes No No Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ?
YAM Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No No ? ? ?
Zimbra Yes No No Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? ? ?
Client POP3
fetch all messages		 POP3
selected by filter		 POP3
selected by user		 IMAP4 SMTP NNTP LDAP v2 LDAP v3 EWS IPv6 MAPI
Client IMSP
 ACAP
 RSS 0.91 Feeds RSS 1.0 Feeds RSS 2.0 Feeds ATOM Feeds iCalendar MAPI/RPC CalDAV CardDAV
Alpine ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Atmail Yes Yes No No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes
Becky! Internet Mail ? ? Yes [Note 9] Yes [Note 9] Yes [Note 9] Yes [Note 9] ? ? ? ?
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail ? ? No Yes [Note 10] Yes [Note 10] Yes [Note 10] Yes [Note 11] ? ? ?
Cone No No No No No No No ? ? ?
Courier No No No No No No No ? ? ?
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client No No Yes Yes Yes No Yes No Yes Yes
EmailTray No No No No No No No No ? ?
Eudora No Yes No No No No No ? ? ?
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution No No No [Note 12] No [Note 12] No [Note 12] No Yes Yes Yes Yes
Gnus ? ? Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ? ?
GroupWise ? No ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe No No No No No No No Yes ? ?
IBM Lotus Notes No No Yes [Note 13] Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
KMail ? ? Yes [Note 14] Yes [Note 14] Yes [Note 14] Yes [Note 14] Yes [Note 15] ? ? ?
Mail ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 16] ? Yes Yes
Microsoft Entourage ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ?
Microsoft Office Outlook ? ? Yes [Note 17] Yes [Note 17] Yes [Note 17] Yes [Note 17] Yes [Note 18] Yes No No
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 19] Yes [Note 20] ? ?
Mulberry Yes Yes No No No No Yes ? Yes ?
Mutt ? ? No No No No No ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes No ? No No
Outlook Express ? ? No No No No No ? No No
Pegasus Mail ? ? Yes [Note 5] Yes [Note 5] Yes [Note 5] ? ? ? ? ?
Pine No No No No No No No ? ? ?
Pocomail No No Yes Yes Yes No No ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 19] ? ? ?
Spicebird No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 19] No ? ?
SquirrelMail ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ?
Sylpheed No No No No No No No No ? ?
The Bat! No No Yes [Note 21] Yes [Note 21] Yes [Note 21] Yes [Note 21] No Yes ? ?
Trojitá No No No No No No No No ? ?
Turnpike ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ?
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM No No No No No No No ? ? ?
Zimbra ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
Client IMSP ACAP RSS 0.91 Feeds RSS 1.0 Feeds RSS 2.0 Feeds ATOM Feeds iCalendar MAPI/RPC CalDAV CardDAV
  1. ^ Becky! requires FRNews or BkNews plugin installed for handling NNTP.
  2. ^ Cone has an option to either keep all POP3 mail on the server, or download all messages from the POP3 mailbox.
  3. ^ a b i.Scribe / InScribe requires a plugin to handle LDAP.
  4. ^ KDE supports Newsgroups (NNTP) by the use of KNode
  5. ^ a b c d Pegasus Mail can convert Newsgroup messages and/or RSS feeds to emails through the use of free add-ons.
  6. ^ Selective Download filters can skip/delete messages on POP3 server based on header (sender, recipient, subject, etc) information, this doesn't require to retrieve the full message body from the server.
  7. ^ Message Dispatcher allows the user to decide which messages should be retrieved, deleted or skipped based on the header information (sender, recipient, subject, etc) displayed to the user.
  8. ^ The BAT! requires MyGate plugin installed for handling NNTP.
  9. ^ a b c d Becky! requires BkBlogReader or BkRSSviewer or B.F.R or BkRssReader plugin installed for handling RSS and ATOM.
  10. ^ a b c RSSyl plugin is required to read RSS and ATOM in Claws Mail.
  11. ^ vCalendar plugin is required to handle iCalendar in Claws Mail.
  12. ^ a b c The evolution-rss plugin (provided as a separate package by many distributions provides the RSS functionality in Evolution.
  13. ^ Studio Blog Reader is one RSS reader application for IBM Lotus Notes. IBM Lotus Notes version 8.x introduced a native RSS reader.
  14. ^ a b c d KDE supports feeds by the use of Akregator
  15. ^ KDE supports iCal by the use of KOrganizer
  16. ^ With Mail version 4, in Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard. In previous versions, Mail only links it with iCal.
  17. ^ a b c d Support of feeds is available in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. Earlier versions require RSSPopper plug-in.
  18. ^ Microsoft Outlook support of iCalendar varies by version.
  19. ^ a b c iCalendar is supported with an extension.
  20. ^ Mozilla Thunderbird only supports SimpleMAPI.[citation needed]
  21. ^ a b c d The BAT! requires rss2mail or rss2pop3 plugin installed for handling RSS and ATOM.

Authentication support[edit]

Client Regular MSN (NTLM)

browser login

 Compuserve

(RPA)

 MD5 APOP [Note 1] CRAM-HMAC [Note 2] DIGEST-MD5 with hardware token

PKCS#11

 Biometric SMTP Auth [Note 3] SSL/TLS Client Certificate
LOGIN PLAIN MD5 SHA1 RIPEMD
Alpine Yes Yes No No No Yes No No No No No Yes No
Atmail Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes [Note 4] ? Yes Yes
Cone Yes Yes No No No Yes Yes No No No No Yes Yes
Courier Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No Yes Yes
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No No Yes No No Yes No
EmailTray Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes No ? No No Yes No
Eudora Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No No ?
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No Yes No No Yes Yes
Gnus Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? Yes ?
GroupWise ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No No No No No Yes No
IBM Lotus Notes Yes ? Yes No No No ? ? ? Yes No Yes ?
KMail Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No Yes No No Yes Yes
Mail Yes Yes Yes [Note 5] No Yes Yes [Note 6] ? ? ? ? ? Yes ?
Microsoft Entourage Yes No Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes No Yes No No No No No No No No Yes No
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No No [4] Yes No Yes Yes
Mulberry Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No No Yes No No Yes Yes
Mutt Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes No No Yes No No 1.5.15 Yes
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail Yes Yes No No Yes Yes No ? ? No No Yes Yes
Outlook Express Yes No Yes No No No No No No No No Yes No
Pegasus Mail Yes ? No No Yes No No No No No No Yes Yes
Pine Yes Yes No No No Yes No No No No No Yes No
Pocomail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No No [5] Yes No Yes Yes
SquirrelMail Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes ?
Sylpheed Yes Yes No No Yes Yes No No No No No Yes No
The Bat! Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No Yes [Note 7] Yes [Note 7] Yes No
Trojitá Yes No No No No No No No No No No Yes No
Turnpike ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail Yes No Yes No Yes No No No No No No No No
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? AmiSSL
Zimbra Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ? ?
Client Regular MSN (NTLM)

browser login

 Compuserve

(RPA)

 MD5 APOP [Note 1] CRAM-HMAC [Note 2] DIGEST-MD5 with hardware token

PKCS#11

 Biometric SMTP Auth [Note 3] SSL/TLS Client Certificate
LOGIN PLAIN MD5 SHA1 RIPEMD
  1. ^ a b Description: RFC 1734
  2. ^ a b Description: RFC 2195
  3. ^ a b Description: RFC 2554
  4. ^ Claws Mail requires S/MIME plugin installed.
  5. ^ Apple supports NTLM v2 in Mail as of 10.4 release
  6. ^ 10.1.3 Apple adds SSL and CRAM-MD5 support to Mail
  7. ^ a b Professional Edition.

SSL and TLS support[edit]

Client Secure POP3 Secure IMAP4 Secure SMTP Secure NNTP Secure LDAP OCSP [Note 1] CRL [Note 2]
SSL TLS [Note 3] SSL TLS [Note 3] SSL TLS [Note 4] SSL TLS SSL TLS
Alpine Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? ?
Atmail No No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes ? ?
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
Cone Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes No No
Courier No No No No No No No No No No No No
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No Yes
EmailTray Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No No
Eudora Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes ? ?
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Gnus ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
GroupWise ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No No No No No
IBM Lotus Notes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes
KMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No ? ? ? ?
Mail Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? No No Yes ? ? ?
Microsoft Entourage Yes ? Yes ? Yes ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ?
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Mulberry Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes ? ?
Mutt Yes Yes Yes Yes 1.5.15 1.5.15 ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail Yes Partial [Note 5] Yes Partial [Note 5] Yes Partial [Note 5] Yes No N/A N/A Yes Yes
Outlook Express Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Pegasus Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ?
Pine Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No ? ?
Pocomail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Spicebird Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
SquirrelMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes Yes ? ?
Sylpheed Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ?
The Bat! Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No Yes [Note 6] Yes [Note 6]
Trojitá ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes (system) Yes (system)
Turnpike ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail Yes No Yes No Yes No ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Mail Yes ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Zimbra Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ?
Client Secure POP3 Secure IMAP4 Secure SMTP Secure NNTP Secure LDAP OCSP [Note 1] CRL [Note 2]
SSL TLS [Note 3] SSL TLS [Note 3] SSL TLS [Note 4] SSL TLS SSL TLS
  1. ^ a b Online Certificate Status Protocol - Description: RFC 2560
  2. ^ a b Certificate Revocation List - Description: RFC 3280
  3. ^ a b c d Description: RFC 2595
  4. ^ a b Description: RFC 2487
  5. ^ a b c Opera Mail does not support STARTTLS command on special ports, like 995 for pop3 connection
  6. ^ a b Since version 4.2, The Bat! supports two modes of X.509 certificate handling: Internal Implementation and via Microsoft Crypto API. CRLs and OCSP are only supported in the latter mode during TLS connections.

Features[edit]

Information on what features each of the clients support.

General features[edit]

For all of these clients, the concept of "HTML support" does not mean that they can process the full range of HTML that a web browser can handle. Almost all email readers limit HTML features, either for security reasons, or because of the nature of the interface. CSS and JavaScript can be especially problematic. A number of articles describe these limitations per-email-client; see 1, 2, 3, and 4

Client HTML email UTF-8 support Image blocking Junk filtering Phishing filtering Thread view Conversation view PGP support S/MIME support
local server- side inline PGP/MIME or OpenPGP protocol OCSP CRL certificates on tokens, smartcards support
Alpine Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes ? Yes ? Yes ? ? ?
Atmail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes Yes No No No Yes No Yes ? Yes ? ? ?
Citadel Yes Yes No Yes [Note 1] ? ? No ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Read-only Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes
Cone Yes Yes Yes Yes No No Yes ? No Yes No No No No
Courier Yes No No Yes Yes ? No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No No No Yes No Yes Yes
EmailTray Yes Yes Yes No Yes ? No No No No No No No No
Eudora Yes No Yes Pro only Pro only ? Yes No Yes [Note 2] Yes [Note 2] Yes ? ? ?
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes Yes Yes Yes ? No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ?
Gnus Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes
GroupWise Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Read-only Yes Yes Yes No ? Yes ? Yes No No No No No
IBM Notes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 3] ? Yes Yes
(4.1.2+)		 Yes Yes, [6] Yes Yes
KMail Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes
(with GPG)		 Yes
(1.5+, with GPGME)		 Yes Yes Yes ?
Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 4] Yes [Note 4] Yes Yes Yes Yes
Mailbird Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? Yes
Microsoft Entourage Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? Yes
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes (2010+)[46] No No Yes ? ? ?
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes [Note 5] Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 6] Yes Yes Yes [Note 7] Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
Mulberry Yes Yes Yes No Yes ? Yes ? Yes [Note 8] Yes [Note 8] Yes [Note 8] ? ? ?
Mutt Read-only Yes Yes
(no support for images)		 Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes (with GPGME) ?
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes No No No No No No No
Outlook Express Yes Yes Yes No ? ? Yes ? Yes [Note 9] No [Note 10] Yes ? ? ?
Pegasus Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes
(sending is broken)		 ? No No No
Pine Read-only Yes Yes No ? ? Yes ? Yes
(with Pine Privacy Guard)		 No Yes ? ? ?
Pocomail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes [Note 7] Yes [Note 7] Yes Yes ? Yes
Spicebird Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
SquirrelMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes (depends on antivirus) Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ?
Sylpheed No [Note 11] Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ?
The Bat! Yes Yes Yes [Note 12] Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Partial [Note 13] Partial [Note 13] Yes [Note 13]
Trojitá Read only Yes Yes No Yes No Yes Yes No No No No No No
Turnpike Read-only ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ?
Windows Mail Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Zimbra Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes (depends on antivirus) Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ?
Client HTML email UTF-8 support Image blocking Junk filtering Phishing filtering Thread view Conver- sation view PGP support S/MIME support
local server- side inline PGP/MIME or OpenPGP protocol OCSP CRL certificates on tokens, smartcards support
  1. ^ Citadel plugs Mail into SpamAssassin
  2. ^ a b Eudora requires a plugin to handle PGP.
  3. ^ First release 6.0 (September 2003), [1] enhancements introduced in release 7.0 (August 2005)
  4. ^ a b Mail requires [2] GPGMail-plugin.
  5. ^ Although Thunderbird supports UTF-8, its handling of line wraps causes problems with long lines of text that don't contain spaces, which essentially makes it unusable for certain languages (e.g. Chinese, Japanese, Korean) [3]
  6. ^ Mozilla Thunderbird adds this feature in Thunderbird 1.5.0.4
  7. ^ a b c Using PGP in Thunderbird requires Enigmail.
  8. ^ a b c PGP/GPG and S/MIME support require a free (included) plugin.
  9. ^ Using PGP in Outlook Express requires a plugin.
  10. ^ Outlook Express does not display PGP/MIME signed messages.
  11. ^ Sylpheed has some limited ability to show HTML email. It can show the plain text that's left after stripping away all the HTML tags. Sylpheed has no ability to compose HTML.
  12. ^ The Bat is not able to display inline images.
  13. ^ a b c The Bat! supports two modes of S/MIME: Internal Implementation and via Microsoft Crypto API.[47] CRLs and OCSP are only supported in the latter mode. Internal implementation only supports Aladdin eToken Pro or Rainbow iKey1000[48] tokens and can import certificates (from PKCS#12/PFX format) which were created outside The Bat!. CryptoAPI supports any kind of tokens and smart cards which have a corresponding Cryptographic Service Provider installed.

Messages features[edit]

Client Label messages Reformat received messages Bi-directional text support Composing messages Native images preview Postpone/?scheduled message sending Native documents preview
with colors with flag antidelete add note edit headers (e.g., Subject) forced recode [Note 1] Spell checking Signatures Bottom-posts replies jpeg gif bmp png others txt pdf doc xls odt ods others
Alpine Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Atmail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes with a plugin ? ? ? ? ?
Cone Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ? Yes No ? No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Courier Yes Yes No No Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? No No No No No Yes ? No No No No No ?
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes Yes No No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
EmailTray Yes No No No No No ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? No Yes Yes Yes Yes No No ?
Eudora Yes Yes No No Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes QuickTime Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes Yes ? ? No ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Gnus Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes XPM Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
GroupWise Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes No No Yes No No No Yes [Note 2] Yes Yes Yes [Note 3] Yes Yes Yes [Note 4] ICO, TIFF Yes No No No No No No No
IBM Notes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes No CGM, Lotus PIC, PCX, TIFF ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
KMail Yes[61] Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mail Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes any QuickTime supported format No ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Mailbird Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No ?
Microsoft Entourage Yes Yes ? Yes[Note 5] ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes with a plugin Yes Yes 2010 2010 PowerPoint
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes ? ? with a plugin[7], not via IMAP [8] ? ? Yes Yes Yes [Note 6] Yes Yes Yes Yes ICO Yes [Note 7] Yes No No No No No No
Mulberry ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mutt Yes Yes No No Yes ? ? Yes Yes ? No No No No No postpone ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail Yes Yes No No ? ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes APNG, ICO, SVG, WBMP, XBM, WebP No No No No No No No No
Outlook Express No Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ICO, art ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Pegasus Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes in index No No Yes Yes No [Note 8] Yes Yes Yes Yes TIFF N/A Yes No No No No No RTF, HTML
Pine Yes Yes ? ? No with a patch [Note 9] ? Yes [Note 10] Yes ? No No No No No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Pocomail Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups Yes Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SquirrelMail Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ?
Sylpheed Yes Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes No No No No No ?
The Bat! Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ICO, emf Yes Yes No No No No No No
Trojitá No Yes ? ? No No Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No ?
Turnpike Yes ? ? No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes No ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail No Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Zimbra Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Client Label messages Reformat received messages Bi-directional text support Composing messages Native images preview Postpone/?scheduled message sending Native documents preview
with colors with flag antidelete add note edit headers (e.g., Subject) forced recode [Note 1] Spell checking Signatures Bottom-posts replies jpeg gif bmp png others txt pdf doc xls odt ods others
  1. ^ a b It's a frequent problem for people dealing with Cyrillic/Russian in email messages that the message is not encoded in the encoding declared in its headers and thus can't be read. With such a message (with a wrong declaration of the encoding), it well might be the case that it passed through several incorrect recoding stages while it was being sent and delivered; thus it's not possible to correctly render it and read it if one uses the common type of the interface for choosing the encoding (such as the menu in Mozilla Firefox). An example of such a complex case of a wrongly declared encoding: a message was entered through a webform in the windows-1251 encoding, but the web interface incorrectly assumed that it was in latin-1; based on this assumption, it performed the recoding from latin-1 to utf-8. The result of this operation cannot be correctly decoded through the common encoding-selection interface; it can only be decoded through a two-stage recoding: first from utf-8 to latin-1, then from windows-1251 to utf-8 (assuming that one works in a Unicode environment). After it is decoded, it is desirable to store it in the recoded form instead of the original, in order to be able to read it easily afterwards, and to quote it for replies.
  2. ^ i.Scribe / InScribe supports full integration with GNU Aspell, which is its requirement for spell checking.
  3. ^ i.Scribe / InScribe requires libjpeg.
  4. ^ i.Scribe / InScribe requires libpng.
  5. ^ Entourage can link a message to a note.
  6. ^ Configurable to start replies at top or bottom, with separate configuration of signature position
  7. ^ Thunderbird requires SL8TR extension.
  8. ^ Starts replies with cursor at top, but is configurable regarding whether to include a blank space at the top for replies or not; some interleaved-posting users prefer starting the cursor at the top so they can trim the quotes
  9. ^ The recoding engine and interface extensions that would solve the described recoding problems have been developed as a patch for Pine; it is to be found in the package pine-4.58L-alt4.src.rpm(ftp) for ALTLinux (under the name pine-4.58L-alt2-0.4.1.diff). Its essential feature is to enable to forcibly recode messages, save them in the recoded form, and quote in replies.
  10. ^ Pine supports full integration with GNU Aspell or other external speller, which is its requirement for spell checking.

Database, folders and customization[edit]

Client Message file format Encrypted database Virtual folders Scheduled backup New mail notification Customizable interface Customizable keybindings Fragmented messages [Note 1] Database search with regular expressions support Indexed search Search folders [Note 2] IMAP
ticker tray icon tooltip sound Search IDLE
Alpine mbox, mbx, MIX, maildir (with patches), MMDF, tenex, mtx, MH, mx, news, phile ? Yes Partial ? ? ? Yes Yes No ? No Yes Yes Yes No
Atmail maildir, imap, mbox Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ?
Becky! Internet Mail mbox ? ? No Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes Yes
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail MH, mbox (plugin) No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? No Yes No
Cone mbox, maildir No No No No ? ? ? Yes (colors) No No No No Yes Yes Yes
Courier Proprietary Yes (weak) Yes ? ? ? ? ? Yes (layout) No ? No No Yes No Yes
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Proprietary (sqlite) Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes No No No Yes Yes No Yes
EmailTray Proprietary Yes Yes No Yes Yes No Yes No No No No Yes Yes ? ?
Eudora modified mbox No Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes[specify] Yes Yes Yes ?
Eureka Email Proprietary ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution maildir, mbox, MH No Yes No No Yes Yes Yes Partial Yes [Note 3] Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Gnus babyl, maildir, mbox, MMDF, news, rnews, SOUP, outlook, oe-dbx No Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes ?
GroupWise Proprietary Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes No
i.Scribe / InScribe Proprietary (sqlite) No No No No Yes No Yes Yes No No No No No No Yes
IBM Notes Proprietary Yes [9] Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 4] No Yes Yes ? No
KMail mbox, maildir No Yes No ? ? ? ? Yes Yes No Yes ? Yes Yes Yes
Mail Proprietary ? Yes Yes ? Yes ? Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes [Note 5] Yes [Note 6] ? Yes
Mailbird Proprietary No Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Partial Yes Yes Yes
Microsoft Entourage Proprietary (Personal Storage Table) ? Yes Partial [Note 7] ? ? ? ? Partial No No Partial [Note 8] Yes Yes Yes Yes
Microsoft Office Outlook Proprietary (Personal Storage Table) Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes [Note 9] Yes Yes Yes
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups mbox ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird mbox No Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes [Note 10] ? No ? Yes (as of 3.0) Yes Yes Yes
Mulberry mbox [Note 11] Partial [Note 12] Partial [Note 12] Partial [Note 12] ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes[specify] Partial [Note 12] No Yes No
Mutt mbox, MMDF, MH, maildir Yes (with compressed folders patch [10]) ? (has limit command) No ? ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes no integrated solutions available[72] No (easily integrated with mairix) Yes Yes
Netscape Messenger mbox ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 mbox ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH MH No Yes No No ? ? ? Yes Yes ? Yes Yes Yes No ?
Opera Mail mbox, MH, Proprietary No Yes
(all folders are virtual)		 No No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
Outlook Express Proprietary No No No ? Yes No Yes No No Yes ? No ? ? Yes
Pegasus Mail Proprietary (mbox-like) No Yes No ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? Yes Yes ?
Pine mbox, mbx, MIX, maildir (with patches), MMDF, tenex, mtx, MH, mx, news, phile ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? No
Pocomail mbox Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes Yes Yes ? ?
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups mbox ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes
SquirrelMail [IMAP Server] ? ? ? Yes No No Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ?
Sylpheed MH No Yes No ? Yes ? ? Yes Yes No No [Note 13] No [Note 13] Yes ? No
The Bat! Proprietary Yes (RC2 128 bit)

(with Pro and Voyager version) [Note 14]

 Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

(PCRE 6.2)

 No Yes Yes ?
Trojitá ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes Yes
Turnpike Proprietary Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? Yes ? ?
Windows Live Mail ? No No No No Yes ? Yes Yes No Yes No Yes Yes ? ?
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Yes
YAM ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Zimbra File system Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Client Message file format Encrypted database Virtual folders Scheduled backup New mail notification Customizable interface Customizable keybindings Fragmented messages [Note 1] Database search with regular expressions support Indexed search Search folders [Note 2] IMAP
ticker tray icon tooltip sound Search IDLE
  1. ^ a b Fragmented messages make it possible, for example, to send a large audio message as several partial messages, and still have it appear to the recipient as a simple audio message rather than as an encapsulated message containing an audio message. RFC 2046
  2. ^ a b Search Folders are virtual folders that contain views of all email items matching specific search criteria. Search Folders display the results of previously defined search queries.
  3. ^ Editable keybindings is part of GNOME, provided "Editable menu accelerators" is enabled in GNOME's "Menus & Toolbars" control applet.
  4. ^ Fragmented messages are called truncated document in Lotus Notes.
  5. ^ with Spotlight Mac OS X v. 10.4
  6. ^ Search folders is called Smart Folders in Mail on Mac OS X v. 10.4.
  7. ^ With Entourage 2008, you can use AppleScript and various internal/external scheduling mechanisms to create timed backups of Entourage Data.
  8. ^ With Entourage 2008 and later versions of 2004, you can use the Spotlight data to search what's in the Entourage database via regular expression in the file system in Terminal or via Spotlight's ...interesting...version of "regular expressions".
  9. ^ supported since Office 2007.
  10. ^ Thunderbird's interface can be user customized via the use of themes (which can reposition and skin controls)
  11. ^ This is for Mulberry's 'offline browsing' capability, which is turned off by default. In the default configuration no local copy of the mail is created.
  12. ^ a b c d Mulberry is a dedicated IMAP client; If the IMAP server has these abilities, Mulberry can use them.
  13. ^ a b Because MH stores each letter in a separate file, it is trivially easy to (externally) search them with grep. This ease is shattered when non-raw encodings are used, such as base64.
  14. ^ The Bat! Pro support two methods access to program when database is encrypted: password authorization and token authorization; Voyager support only password authorization and encrypted database is default and only available storage method.

Templates, scripts and programming languages[edit]

Client Message templates Message templates individual for Support in message templates scripts, programming languages
new reply forward read confirmation save print JavaScript VBScript PHP Scripts Python Regular expressions Java Other (specify)
Alpine Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? any No No No No ? No ?
Atmail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes any Yes No Yes No No No No
Becky! Internet Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes any
account
folder
 ? ? ? ? ? ?
Citadel ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Claws Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes account
folder
 No No No Yes ? ? Perl, Python
Cone Yes No No No No No ? No No No No No No No
Courier Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes ? No No No No No No No
Elm ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
eM Client Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes account No No No No No No No
Eudora Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes any No No No No Yes No No
Eureka Email ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Evolution Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Gnus Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? No No No No Yes No elisp
GroupWise Yes No No Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
i.Scribe / InScribe Yes Yes Yes No No No any No No No No No No Internal macros (similar to JavaScript)
IBM Notes Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? Yes No No No Yes [11] Yes LotusScript, Formula language
KMail Yes Yes Yes No No No none ? No No No ? ? ?
Mail Yes Mac OS 10.5 (Leopard) No No No ? ? ? No No No No No ? AppleScript, Automator
Microsoft Entourage Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? AppleScript, Automator
Microsoft Office Outlook Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mozilla Thunderbird Yes Yes[Note 1] Yes[Note 1] Yes Yes Yes profile Yes ? ? ? ? ? ?
Mulberry Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? No No No No ? ? ?
Mutt Yes Yes Yes No ? ? any No No No No Yes ? Internal macros
Netscape Messenger ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Netscape Messenger 9 ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
nmh / MH ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Opera Mail No No No No No No N/A No No No No No No No
Outlook Express Yes Yes ? Yes ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Pegasus Mail Yes Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Pine Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? any ? No No ? ? No ?
Pocomail Yes Yes Yes ? ? Yes ? No No No No No No PocoScript
SeaMonkey Mail & Newsgroups ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
SquirrelMail Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No No No ?
Sylpheed Yes Yes Yes ? ? ? ? No No No No No ? ?
The Bat! Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes account
folder
address book group
contact		 Yes [Note 2] Yes [Note 3] Yes [Note 4] Yes [Note 5] Yes PCRE 6.2 Internal and plugins macros
Turnpike ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Live Mail Yes[Note 6] Yes[Note 6] ? Yes[Note 6] ? ? ? Yes Yes ? ? ? ? ?
Windows Mail ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
YAM Yes Yes Yes ? Yes Yes ? No No No No ? ? ARexx
Zimbra Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes any No No No No No ? ?
Client Message templates Message templates individual for Support in message templates scripts, programming languages
new reply forward read confirmation save print JavaScript VBScript PHP Scripts Python Regular expressions Java Other (specify)
  1. ^ a b Thunderbird supports HTML templates with "Stationery" add-on.
  2. ^ The Bat! supports JavaScript in message templates with the JavaScript Macro plugin.
  3. ^ The Bat! supports VBScript in message templates with the XMP plugin.
  4. ^ The Bat! supports PHP in message templates with the XMP plugin.
  5. ^ The Bat! supports Python in message templates with the TBPyxie plugin.
  6. ^ a b c Weak "stationery" system that only accept pages done with Word.

Internationalization[edit]

The Bat! supports Email Address Internationalization (EAI) [93][better source needed][discuss]

Currently there are no mail clients know to support SMTPUTF8.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b "The Birth of Eudora". Retrieved 2007-04-10. 
  2. ^ Clasen, Matthias (26 September 2013), GNOME 3.10 Released, GNOME mailing list, retrieved 26 September 2013 
  3. ^ a b "GNUS: a NNTP based news reader for GNU Emacs (1 of 2)". Retrieved 2008-08-04. 
  4. ^ "KDE Ships February Updates to Applications and Platform". KDE. 4 February 2014. Retrieved 22 February 2014. 
  5. ^ "Thunderbird Release Notes". mozilla.org. February 4, 2014. Retrieved February 4, 2014. 
  6. ^ "Opera Mail". 2013-06-11. 
  7. ^ "SeaMonkey 2.24". 2014-02-06. Retrieved 2014-02-06. 
  8. ^ "Other Programming Projects and Downloads". Retrieved 2007-04-06. 
  9. ^ "PC-PINE-3.96 README". Retrieved 2007-04-06. 
  10. ^ Write to LDAP still missing after 10 years, Mozilla bug 86405
  11. ^ Add-ons include MesQuilla ExQuilla Exchange Web Services (alpha) and Provider for Microsoft Exchange
  12. ^ Sort Your Emails by Conversation in Outlook 2010 - How-To Geek
  13. ^ "List of features of The Bat! email client". 
  14. ^ "The Bat! with Hardware Tokens". 
  15. ^ http://www.google.com/search?q=kmail+colors&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=com.ubuntu:en-US:unofficial&client=firefox-a
  16. ^ MuttWiki: UserCases/SearchingMail
  17. ^ "Starting with the version 6.0 The Bat! supports IDN (Internationalized Domain Names))". 

External links[edit]
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