iOS Mail alternate options: 5 business-friendly choices
The iPhone’s built-in Mail app isn’t the one sport on the town. These 5 highly effective electronic mail apps supply a variety of superior options for enterprise customers.
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Apple consists of its Mail app on each iPhone. While it’s a completely usable electronic mail consumer that connects to quite a lot of mail companies together with Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft 365, it isn’t as feature-rich because it could possibly be, notably for enterprise and enterprise environments.
Thankfully, there’s a variety of different electronic mail apps for iOS. In this text, I’ll talk about 5 wonderful decisions, every with its personal distinctive function set.
One notice earlier than we get began: I’m solely together with mail apps that hook up with a number of companies. Services like Gmail and Yahoo Mail supply first-party apps that join with solely that service. They are usually strong choices in the event you solely have to entry a single service.
Outlook
Outlook is Microsoft’s mail and calendar app for iOS. It connects natively to Exchange and Microsoft 365 and allows deep integration with Outlook for Windows or macOS, making it a wonderful and apparent selection in lots of enterprises. But Outlook isn’t a one-trick pony. It helps different mail companies as effectively, which means it may be helpful in order for you a single mail consumer for work and residential, or for conditions the place you could entry a number of work-related accounts.
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Outlook’s clear interface makes the app straightforward to navigate.
Outlook’s iOS interface is surprisingly clear and straightforward to navigate — in some methods it’s higher than its desktop sibling. Microsoft additionally provides a wonderful Outlook watchOS app that continues that clear interface.
Like the Outlook desktop consumer, the iOS app reduces inbox litter with an optionally available Focused Inbox function, which places messages Outlook deems extra necessary within the inbox’s important Focused tab. Less necessary emails are positioned out of the way in which in Other tab. Other helpful message dealing with options embody optionally available message threading and the flexibility to rapidly flag, pin, or snooze messages by way of swiping or just a few faucets.
While the mail element of Outlook is sort of good, the calendar element could possibly be higher, and also you would possibly need to depend on a devoted calendar app like Fantastical, or Readdle’s Calendars, or Apple’s built-in Calendar.
Spark
Spark is a wonderful mail app from Readdle that connects to all the main electronic mail companies. It has a novel interface for serving to you kind by way of your mail by grouping new messages into three classes: folks, notifications, and newsletters. This lets you deal with notification messages and people from particular person folks instantly, then look by way of emails despatched to teams later. This sorting of messages doesn’t place them in separate folders (although Spark does assist folders) — it merely separates the way you view objects in your inbox, and you may swap to a extra commonplace inbox view at any time.
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Spark types incoming messages into People, Notifications, and Newsletters sections.
Spark provides the flexibility to snooze messages to take a look at them later, and it permits most actions like delete, archive, or pin to be performed with particular swipes. It additionally provides workflow administration choices, with the flexibility to mark emails as “done” or “set aside for later review, and its pin feature allows you to mark emails that need a response or a follow-up. You can also recall a sent email — essentially, you have a few seconds to click “undo” after clicking “send.”
Spark’s watchOS app includes a very totally different interface from its iOS and macOS apps, however one that’s far more useful for the smaller show — it nonetheless helps inbox sorting and many of the different options, and it really works effectively with Apple Handoff.
Spark additionally provides a set of premium options for each people and organizations. For people, this consists of choices to set priorities for sure messages or senders, block and set “gatekeeper” guidelines, group emails by sender, and mute dialogue threads that don’t require rapid consideration. For organizations, there are alternatives to share draft emails and customary electronic mail templates, shared space for storing, and the flexibility to assign messages or threads to particular group members. With an annual subscription, premium options begin at $5 a month for people and $7 per person monthly for organizations.
Edison Mail
Edison Mail helps all main electronic mail companies. It provides a consumer-oriented function set that’s additionally helpful for enterprise customers, with the flexibility to handle journey plans, package deal monitoring, payments and receipts, and refund standing, and extra when it detects pertinent info in your emails. It additionally provides the flexibility to view and cancel electronic mail subscriptions with a single faucet.
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Edison Mail’s clever search know-how can mechanically filter for emails associated to journey, package deal, billing, and different matters.
There is an optionally available premium function set referred to as Edison Mail+ ($15 monthly or $100 per 12 months) that makes updating contact info simpler, verifies electronic mail senders, blocks spam calls and texts, and shows caller ID info detected out of your emails on incoming calls.
Edison Mail’s interface additionally helps setting swipe choices in your inbox, snoozing messages, and interesting in a spotlight mode to keep away from distractions (one thing a bit outdated by Apple’s Focus mode that debuted in iOS 15), and it features a first rate watchOS app.
Canary Mail
Canary Mail, designed largely round safe messaging utilizing PGP encryption, helps commonest electronic mail companies. Like Spark, it organizes messages in your inbox into a number of classes together with Personal, Social (emails from social media websites or notifications), Updates, Forums (discussion board or listserv emails), and Promotions (emails providing particular offers or companies). Canary additionally helps darkish mode, customized swipe actions, and the flexibility to snooze messages.
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Canary Mail is constructed round safe messaging.
Like Edison Mail, Canary Email provides a premium function set referred to as Canary Pro for a one-time price of $20. The Pro model features a huge array of options together with contact profiles with extra particulars for the sender of any electronic mail, a built-in calendar function, quick access to messages from favourite contacts, pinned emails, compose recommendations when creating a brand new message, customized electronic mail thread actions, customized notifications, an attachments browser, end-to-end encryption, push notifications, learn receipts, customized electronic mail templates, and customised snooze instances.
The developer can be piloting an enterprise choice that features straightforward encryption key administration, enterprise-wide PGP administration, person onboarding, assist for regulatory compliance, and different enterprise options. Businesses can request to be a part of the pilot by deciding on an choice throughout the app.
Spike Email
Spike is an fascinating tackle electronic mail. It organizes all of your electronic mail threads as chat conversations, much like the messaging options of Slack or Microsoft Teams. This makes a wonderful device for group collaboration the place devoted apps like Slack and Teams aren’t obtainable. Email conversations might be sorted by folks or by topic. The app additionally provides shared or group duties and to-dos, in addition to entry to calendars configured in your iPhone.
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With Spike you possibly can kind electronic mail conversations by topic or folks.
Spike permits you to streamline your inbox by separating messages, though its sorting choices are extra restricted than another apps on this record, providing solely Priority (folks you’ve emailed beforehand), Other (emails from “strangers”), and Unread views.
Like different apps, Spike can snooze messages, helps swipe actions for message administration (although in a extra restricted capability than another apps), provides fast message templates, and might be locked after a time frame. (Although the setting exhibits solely Touch ID as an unlock choice, activating it is going to activate unlock with Face ID on units that assist Face ID.)
Spike’s free plan helps only one electronic mail deal with and limits search outcomes to the final 60 days. To embody extra addresses and get limitless search historical past, you’ll have to improve to a paid plan. Pro and Business plans begin at $5 per person monthly (billed yearly) and embody extra storage, group video calls, precedence assist, and different business-oriented options.