I is likely to be a dinosaur, however e-mail continues to be my jam. I desire communicating via email to some other technique of interplay (aside from face-to-face).
Electronic mail is environment friendly, used globally, is not OS-dependent, and permits me to catalog and manage my inbox as I see match, even retaining years of searchable communications. In a nutshell, I depend upon e-mail.
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On Linux, there are a lot of routes you’ll be able to take to profit from e-mail. There are closed-source functions, like Proton Mail and BlueMail. There are even terminal-based e-mail purchasers, reminiscent of Mutt. However I are inclined to desire my e-mail purchasers open.
I’ve used each open-source e-mail shopper obtainable and have decided the next 5 to be the very best. Let’s dig in.
1. Geary
Geary‘s my go-to shopper as a result of it is easy, simple to make use of, and would not get slowed down attempting to be greater than it’s. You will not discover a ton of options on Geary, however the options it has are extremely polished. Most significantly, Geary makes studying e-mail a breeze. The shopper retains every thing clear and neat, so there isn’t any muss or fuss. What I like most about Geary is that it would not get in your manner. It serves one function and one function alone — e-mail.Â
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There is not any calendar, to-dos, or anything to get in your manner of studying and responding to emails. Geary helps Gmail, Outlook.com, Yahoo, POP, and IMAP. The shopper additionally makes it pretty easy so as to add new accounts. I solely have two complaints. First, Geary would not permit you to create folders for IMAP accounts. Second, when you discover an e-mail account providing you with issues, you may uncover that it is difficult to delete the account after which re-add it. Apart from these two points, I have been utilizing Geary for years and have at all times discovered it to be a dependable and simple e-mail shopper that additionally occurs to look good.Â
Geary is free to put in and use and will be present in your distribution’s default repositories.
2. Thunderbird
Thunderbird was my default e-mail shopper for years. I began utilizing Thunderbird in its 1.x launch interval and have at all times discovered it an excellent choice. This open-source e-mail shopper is commonly thought of nice as a result of it could actually achieve this a lot (with out the burden of attempting to do an excessive amount of).Â
Additionally:Â How to encrypt your email (and why you should)
Need to theme your e-mail shopper? Thunderbird has you lined. Want encryption? Yep. What about assist for Gmail (and Google Calendar)? Certainly. Need to customise the UI? You are able to do that. Tags, sortable folders, card views, handle guide, built-in calendar? You title it and Thunderbird can do it, as long as we’re speaking e-mail (with a splash of calendar and contacts sprinkled in). For many who do not know, Thunderbird comes from Mozilla, the group chargeable for the Firefox web browser.
Thunderbird is free to put in and use and will be discovered within the default repositories of all Linux distributions.
3. Evolution
Evolution is to Linux what Outlook is to Home windows. Evolution is a groupware suite and consists of a number of instruments, reminiscent of e-mail, calendars, contacts, duties, and memos. Evolution can just about do something you want. Excellent-click any e-mail in Evolution and also you see what this shopper can do. You may edit a brand new message, print, copy, archive, mark, assign coloration, add notes, ignore, and label.Â
If there is a characteristic you want for an e-mail shopper, you’ll be able to wager Evolution has it. Evolution helps most e-mail suppliers, and encryption, and has a plugin system to increase the characteristic set additional. The shopper has a useful Various Reply characteristic that permits you to choose from reply to sender, reply to checklist, reply to all, set the reply fashion (reminiscent of attachment, inline, quote), choose message formatting, and even apply a template. Consider Evolution because the Swiss Military Knife of Linux e-mail purchasers.
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Evolution is free to put in and will be present in your distribution’s default repositories.
4. KMail
Do you bear in mind the golden days of non-public data managers (PIMs)? Nicely, KMail is Plasma Desktop’s e-mail shopper, which is a part of the Kontact PIM. KMail does an excellent job of integrating into varied Plasma desktop utilities, helps PGP & S/MIME encryption (in addition to end-to-end encryption), consists of highly effective spam detection, and presents a user-friendly interface. When you’ve got massive e-mail accounts, KMail can be proper at dwelling.Â
You may additionally discover assist for a number of e-mail protocols (reminiscent of POP3, IMAP, Microsoft Change, and extra). One oddity with KMail is that it isn’t at all times included with each Plasma Desktop set up. For instance, with KDE Neon, you should set up KMail by way of Uncover. However when you’re a fan of the Plasma Desktop, it’s best to think about KMail as your go-to e-mail shopper.
KMail is offered to put in and use at no cost and will be discovered within the default repository of your favourite Linux distribution.
5. Claws Mail
About 15 years in the past, Claws Mail was my default e-mail shopper. What I cherished about Claws Mail was how extremely configurable it was. I might make Claws Mail do absolutely anything I wanted. I might spend hours customizing Claws Mail solely to barely scratch the floor of what it could actually do. Nevertheless, Claws Mail shouldn’t be for rookies. If you happen to don’t love having to tinker with issues to get them to work, keep away from Claws Mail. Nevertheless, when you like tinkering, then Claws Mail must be close to the highest of your checklist. Claws Mail is light-weight and presents tons of flexibility and configuration.Â
One factor to contemplate is that you simply get a UI with Claws Mail that appears prefer it’s from the late Nineties or early 2000s. It is old fashioned. On the similar time, you get extra options than you may discover in most e-mail purchasers. Claws Mail consists of actions, templates, reply finder, quick message caching, per-folder processing, customizable toolbars, dynamic signatures, font configurations, themes, message scoring, return-receipt dealing with, anti-phishing URL checks, user-defined citation characters, log window, and far more.Â
Claws Mail will be put in and used at no cost, and will be present in your distribution’s default repository.
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I am assured that you will discover your subsequent favourite e-mail shopper in my checklist. If none of those purchasers meet your wants, worry not, I am going to cowl the very best proprietary e-mail purchasers quickly.
