If you have a POP3 enabled email or if your Email service providers lets you to access mail from a desktop client, then there are quite a few options to access mail. Most commonly used program is Microsoft Outlook. But Outlook comes bundled with Office suite which is not a freeware. For those who cannot afford the MS office or those looking for an alternative to Outlook, here is a list of 12 freewares to check Email.
1. Thunderbird: Mozilla Thunderbird is a good, fully features and secure email client and RSS reader. It features lot of options like the Outlook and also has large number of add-ons like Firefox for better management of Emails. You can also check out the top5 Thunderbird extensions.
2. Windows Mail: Windows Mail is a free email program from Microsoft which replaces the Outlook Express. Windows Mail also supports RSS feeds and has good features. It comes bundled with Vista. It is relatively safe with spam and phishing filters.
3. Eudora: Eudora is another good email client software which is powerful, flexible and loaded with features. Eudora is a good spam filter and can handle multiple POP3 and IMAP accounts. Eudora also has a Fast index search.
4. Opera: Opera Mail is the email client bundled in the Opera suite of Internet tools which includes a feature-packed web browser, newsgroup and RSS reader, as well as an IRC chat client. Opera has good functionality which you can expect in an email client and it also features virtual folders concept.
5. Mozilla Mail: Mozilla Mail is the email application from the open-source Mozilla Internet Suite, which include a browser, an HTML editor and an IRC client program. It has features of Thunderbird and only major difference is that its not a standalone application.
6. Incredimail: Incredimail is another easy to use Email client which has decent features and a good spam prevention. Only drawback of Incredimail is the not suited for email accounts with large number of emails.
7. Mulberry: Mulberry is another powerful email client for all platforms. It has strong security and privacy included. It supports multiple POP and IMAP accounts and only drawback of Mulbery is that its pretty difficult to use.
8. Pegasus Mail: Pegasus mail is another free email client developed over many years and its very powerful and secure program available for Windows. Only drawback of Pegasus is the interface, which could have been better.
9. Foxmail: Foxmail is another free email client which has lot of features but does not supports IMAP mails. Foxmail also has a decent spam filter and security features.
10. ePrompter: ePrompter is a free tool for email notification and retrieval. supports AIM, AOL, Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, Yahoo Beta, POP3, Earthlink, Excite, Juno, Lycos, Mail.com, Mindspring, MSN, MyWay, Netscape, Rediffmail, SBC Yahoo and hundreds of other email domains.
11. Sylpheed: Sylpheed is a Linux based free email client which can also run on Windows. Sylpheed is a simple, lightweight but featured and easy-to-use e-mail client.
12. POP Peeper: POP Peeper is a free tool that runs on Windows and alerts users to new email in their POP3, Hotmail, MSN or Yahoo email accounts. POP Peeper can also be used to read/delete email, and the package supports HTML-format email as well as text mail.
If you use any other free email programs on Windows, please share it in comments.
I say thunderbird,eudora very good 🙂
pop peeper sometime give issues .
haven’t tried opera mail yet 😳
@Rahul,
Thunderbird and Eudora are the popular ones!
I use Thunderbird in one computer and Outlook in the other. I used incredimail once but I believe it hsa to much useless stuffs.
Hi Nirmal,
I Pretty much Favor Thunderbird from all the list.
well i just love eprompter…it is really awesome utility.
eprompter is really cool apart from thunderbird…
Great post Nirmal! Stumbled 🙂
@Matt Jones,
Thanks for the Stumble! 🙂
Thunderbird is the best One 🙂
Nice list nirmal. My fav. will be windows live mail! so many features so many features!!!
Nice list.. stumbled! I am sticking to my GMail interface though for now. 😉
@Mayank,
Good to see you back in Blogging! 🙂
@K-InTheHouse,
Thanks for the stumble. 🙂
I havent tried anyone yet as these are blocked in college .
incredimail is very beautiful but thunderbird addons capability makes me fall in love with it. and foxmail is a very fast client. for linux, sylpheed rocks too.
Nice list, Windows Mail definately is the best option for me, but i will also wait for Gmail to go offline. 😆
I use Thunderbird and windows mail. I used to use Incredimail but gave up to windows mail.
@Madhur,
Same is the case in offices, they block POP3 access.
@Vaibhav and Ram
Windows mail is really a good option with good features.
A bit unrelated here, but a doubt, Nirmal.
You had recommended excerpts in index, on my post…
I added excerpt tag for index.php, archives, categories.php
All that is working fine. But what is the “xxx.php” name of the author post pages? ie, page which lists all posts of a particular author?
Also, is there any other template I have to create and edit to ensure that only excerpt is shown?
Solved it, author post pages doesnt need any particular page, just set up archives….
But is there anything else, other than index, archives, and category.php that I have to place the excerpt tag in?
@Techzilo,
I do not have a page where its shows all the posts by a particular author. But If you have such a page, then show only the titles of the post in that page, once you click the link, you can navigate to the post.
Your theme looks cool – why not add AJAX comments?
Also, when’s your new theme coming out?
@TechZilo,
Ajax comments plugin was not taking up the customizations in comment form, that why removed it. My theme will be available soon.
Cool list, Nimral. I have used the first three and Incredimail. I haven’t tried the rest of them.
I used Eudora when it was still brand new. Time really goes by fast 😀
I use thunderbird and it’s quite good.. Nice list Nirmal!
Thunderbird I’ve tried, not others 😀 I’m gonna download IncrediMail.
I’ve been using Thunderbird for ages now, but many people disagree with the idea of using POP. My friends say they like webmail interface.
Anyways, I wonder why Mozilla is wasting man hours developing two different email clients. Oh yeah, Thunderbird isn’t Mozilla anymore (MailCo)
@Thilak,
Some people like web interface especially if they have used it for long time, they tend to stick on with that.
Yea, Thunderbird is now MailCo. 🙂
@Nirmal: True, I’m a kind of “old-school” guy. When I started using the internet, we didn’t have broadband here, and it was pretty expensive. I always found myself comfortable with email clients. But today, broadband is so cheap and affordable, so lot of people prefer webmail over email client.
Why not Include Windows Live Mail? Remember… Live mail desktop is different to the Windows Mail that comes with Vista.
this is great information for me. thank you
I used a lot of e-mail clients, after hours and hours of tests I find usefull these 3 software : poppeeper (portable of course, for my quick-control sessions) ; komamail (portable, light, powerfull and continually improved) ; Outlook Express (to store all data in a common format).
Nora.
I have used Outlook, Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail, THunderbird and Opera Mail. Personally, I like Thunderbird and Windows Live Mail. Im currently using Outlook 2010 Beta. It’s pretty cool. but I have a PC with nothing but Freeware apps (except Windows) and Truthfully, Thunderbird and Opera Mail is where its at. You can get Windows Live Mail by downloading the Windows Live Suite from Microsoft.
nice post, Q I don’t know why but every thing that google does is on-line, i guess it does leave room for some other companies, to have something in the market
1) Incredimail records every email address that flows through Incredimail, gathers them and then sells them to anyone willing to pay them for them.
2) If you have a problem with the program their tech support is terrible and appears to be poorly trained. I have now sent 3 tech support requests and the first two responses told me to do what I told them in my submission that I had already done. It has now been 2 weeks and they have not responded to my third request to help.
The problem: All of a sudden after a program update 75% of my email was being sent directly to my DELETED ITEMS folder, including addresses that are in my CONTACTS and even addresses in my FAVORITES. They apparently do not know how to fix this problem because they have stopped responding to my requests for help.