![]() Perhaps the best-known of these Mac mail clients is Mailplane, actually not so much a fully-fledged application as a frame within which you can access Gmail (it only works with Gmail, which I’ll call Gmail Classic in this post, and Google Apps, which allows you to map your own domainname to your Google Mail account) from your desktop.īecause of the way email works, you need to host it on a server accessible from the Internet: in practice, this means you have to choose an email provider on whose servers your email reside §. None have ever come close to tempting me into using them as my default mail application. I’ve never had any major issues with Apple Mail, which I’ve been using pretty much continuously in combination with my initial Exchange server and my current Google Apps setup, ever since I switched in 2003 but as I’m of a curious disposition, I have tried out a number of the few alternatives that occasionally became available. The main ones are Mailplane and Postbox, both of which I’ve tried but not found any compelling reason to prefer to Apple Mail. So the launch of Sparrow Mail § is actually a major event, since only a few competitors to Apple Mail are available. Subscribers get access to an exclusive podcast, members-only stories, and a special community.Sparrow Mail, which I am certain will soon establish itself as the best email client for the Mac, launches today on the Mac App Store.Ĭreating an email client from scratch is very difficult: this explains more than anything else why so few genuinely new email clients are available for the Mac, outside of Apple Mail which comes bundled in with OS X. If you appreciate articles like this one, support us by becoming a Six Colors subscriber. ![]() If you’re like me-a Gmail user who wants a real Mac app, and ideally one that’s a better fit to Gmail than Apple Mail-I strongly recommend that you try Mimestream. Jhaveri also says he’s planning an iOS version, and I’d be interested in that, too. I’m glad he’s someone who gets why people would use Gmail and want a Mac app dedicated to it-because I’m that person. Jhaveri says “Email is my passion,” and I wouldn’t stand in the way of anyone who feels passionately about something. The app is written in Swift and feels like a real, native Mac app. (Disclosure: SaneBox is a former sponsor.) It also supports Gmail’s priority Inbox system, though I instead use a series of Gmail tags created by SaneBox. Gmail has some specific quirks-most notably the difference between archiving a message and deleting it-that Mimestream understands innately. Most importantly, it uses Gmail’s API ( not IMAP) to quickly display and archive mail, and to efficiently search my mail repository. (And yes, you can close off the message preview if you prefer to open messages in their own windows.) Mimestream will look familiar to anyone who has used Apple Mail-it’s got a multi-column design with mailboxes on the left, a message list in the center, and message content on the right. (You can sign up at the Mimestream website to request beta access.) I’ve been using it for a couple of months and I full intent to pay for it when it emerges from beta testing. ![]() It’s a dedicated Gmail client app for the Mac that’s more app-like than Mailplane, while keeping the consistency and speed that Gmail offers over Apple Mail. Instead, I found Mimestream, by former Apple Mail engineer Neil Jhaveri. It doesn’t work the way I want my email to work, and it’s inconsistent and slow in just too many ways. I tried to run Gmail in a single-site browser. My frustrations with Apple Mail had driven me to Gmail, and Mailplane was the perfect way to use Gmail on a Mac-in a separate app, with Mac keyboard shortcuts and drag-and-drop support and everything else, while still keeping the speed and efficience of the Gmail web interface. Unfortunately, back in June the makers of Mailplane announced that they were letting the app die due to Google banning embedded browsers from Gmail. I’ve been using Mailplane as my email client for something like a decade. Mimestream is a Mac app reminiscent of Apple Mail, but it uses the Gmail API. ![]() Mimestream: A native Mac app with proper Gmail support
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