Forget Outlook: Why Windows Mail is one of the best email apps

You’ve bought nearly countless choices relating to selecting an e mail shopper. But one of many easiest, finest, and best is true inside Windows itself. No, not Outlook—the native Mail app.

Mail—and its associated app, Calendar—don’t characteristic many bells and whistles. I hardly ever see lists of latest options. But relating to selecting an on a regular basis mail shopper, I typically desire the easy, easy interface of the Mail app versus the extra complicated, cluttered, feature-rich Outlook. Fortunately, when you subscribe to Microsoft 365 and use Windows, you don’t have to decide on one over the opposite. Instead, you need to use Mail after which transfer to Outlook for extra superior features.

Remember, Mail is free and a part of Windows 10 and 11; simply launch the Mail app to get began. Mail will ask in your e mail handle and password, like Outlook, and can take just a few moments to synchronize.

Mail vs. Outlook: The professionals and cons

You’ll rapidly discover that Mail strips e mail all the way down to its most simple parts: an inbox, outbox, and particular person messages. You have the choice to make use of Calendar, People, and To-Do; Outlook places all of them underneath the identical heading, reasonably than separate apps. Of the basic variations between Outlook and Mail, there are two that stand out: the person interface, and the way Mail forgoes sure superior features present in Outlook. The latter’s attraction boils all the way down to group. Outlook affords just a few methods to behave upon (or delay appearing upon) e mail that Mail doesn’t.

On the opposite hand, Mail affords just a few benefits that Outlook doesn’t provide. The first, how Mail handles a number of accounts, intersects neatly with Mail’s strongest benefit—the simplified UI.

In Outlook, there’s actually no apparent approach so as to add an extra e mail account out of your Outlook inbox. To accomplish that, it is advisable click on the File button, which opens the Account Information web page, and from there the Add Account button. The functionality is there, but it surely’s definitely not intuitive.

In Mail, the accounts Mail manages are prominently displayed on the left-hand nav bar, and including an extra e mail account is as straightforward as merely right-clicking the Accounts button. (To be honest, this might be made extra intuitive by including an “Add Account” button right here as effectively. At least Accounts affords you a superb start line.) Mail merely feels higher organized.

Where Mail shines, nevertheless, is absolutely the elimination of visible litter. There’s no approach you may persuade me that this Outlook interface (from an edited model of my inbox) is superior to the way in which Mail presents the identical data. Here, Outlook throws tabs, icons and extra at you:

Mail, nevertheless, simplifies the entire course of. Here, the main target is on the content material, not the interface.

Mark Hachman / IDG

For me, my workflow typically focuses on a single idea or subject, typically summed up within a single e mail thread. I have a tendency to arrange tasks exterior of my e mail, versus attempting to maintain observe of a number of contributions and e mail threads. Mail does help folders, which helps throughout main product releases or occasion protection. This all implies that my workflow is usually reasonably linear, and contours up reasonably effectively with Mail’s strengths. Modern collaboration can typically be messier, with a number of tasks bouncing off a number of collaborators at varied organizations.

That, to be honest, is the place Outlook begins to shine. Collaboration might be complicated, and all of us use totally different strategies to prioritize duties, akin to utilizing rules to automatically assign email to different folders or recipients. While you need to use a hierarchical folder construction inside Outlook to arrange e mail, you can even color-code e mail to create different subdivisions. Outlook additionally lets you set flags to observe up at a future time, kicking the can down the street. Mail actually solely lets you flag an e mail or to mark it as unread, an older however nonetheless legitimate approach of prioritizing an e mail.

There’s no secret right here: Outlook is the e-mail shopper for energy customers. The query it is advisable ask your self is: Are you an e mail energy person? Do it is advisable be?

Mark Hachman / IDG

If not, you’ll discover Mail affords most of what you ask an e mail shopper to do. Navigating it’s easy. Generally, if Mail doesn’t provide what you need on the right-hand rail or the physique of the e-mail, you could find it by clicking the small Settings “gear” on the backside of the web page. That will open up a menu via which you could find frequent options like setting an out-of-office notification or altering your e mail signature.

Otherwise, although, you need to use Outlook and Mail on the identical PC. They’ll discuss to at least one one other, in order that e mail despatched in a single shopper might be “sent” within the different, as effectively. Still, bear in mind that some options are the equal of a one-way avenue. While arranging e mail and creating folders will carry over between Outlook and Mail, you may’t see an e mail that you just’ve color-coded in Outlook with the identical color-coding in Mail. That’s only one approach that Outlook is “sticky,” encouraging you in direction of Outlook and its Microsoft 365 subscription.

Mark Hachman / IDG

In the long run, Mail and Outlook might collide

Ironically, it could not matter which e mail shopper you select, as a result of on Windows, each could also be altering. In January, Windows Central reported on Project Monarch, Microsoft’s effort to remove the confusion between Outlook, Mail, and Outlook for the Web. ZDNet has gone a bit additional, noting that we might even see Monarch debut sometime in March, with a extra formal rollout by the top of the 12 months. Essentially, the aim of Monarch, in response to ZDNet, is so as to add to (or exchange?) Mail with a brand new consolidated Outlook expertise—one shopper to rule all of them. It’s not clear whether or not the Microsoft 365 model of Outlook might be changed by this or not, nevertheless. What it boils all the way down to, although, is that this: Change is coming.

For now, nevertheless, I’m sticking with Mail, dipping my toe into Outlook when essential. To be honest, we’ve been crucial of Windows 11 and the way it eliminates certain features, akin to paring down the capabilities of the Taskbar and Start menu. But that doesn’t imply that streamlining a workflow doesn’t make sense. Mail is an instance of how Microsoft has successfully distilled e mail all the way down to its essence, and it’s possible you’ll merely discover that it really works higher for you than Outlook does.