- That question is likely to start a religious war 😉 I have Outlook at work and Mac Mail on all of my Macs and iOS devices.much prefer using Mail vs Outlook.
- That question is likely to start a religious war 😉 I have Outlook at work and Mac Mail on all of my Macs and iOS devices.much prefer using Mail vs Outlook.
The upshot of all this is a new email app for iOS, Outlook, which is really rather impressive. Outlook for iOS 8 Vs Apple Mail: Interface and general design. Outlook for Mac 2016 preview.
Call me old but I can’t seem to keep up anymore with what exactly is meant with Outlook, Outlook.com Office, Office 365 and logging on with Outlook.com or Microsoft Accounts to Windows and Office.
What is what exactly and what do I use it for when?
Yes, this can become more than a little confusing for anybody sometimes; age doesn’t have much to do with it.
Although the similar naming makes a lot of sense for marketing purposes, for troubleshooting and looking up information it is quite a pain to find out if it indeed applies to you.
The Outlook brand
Basically, the “Outlook” brand stands for everything that focuses on email.
- Outlook is the mail client application of the Microsoft Office suite.
- Outlook.com is a free web based mail account (which used to be Hotmail).
- Outlook Web App (aka OWA) is the web based mail client that is part of Microsoft Exchange Server which is also available for Live@EDU users and subscribers of Office 365 for Business and Exchange Online.
Then there are still some other mail clients within the Outlook brand:
- Outlook Mobile for Windows Phone
- Outlook for Mac
- Outlook Mail for Windows 10
- Outlook Calendar for Windows 10
- Outlook RT for Surface RT and Surface 2
- Outlook Express (only on Windows XP)
Office 365 for Home vs. Office 365 for Business vs. Office 2013
Outlook App On Mac
The Office brand generates quite some additional confusion as well as it can refer to the actual application, a subscription based license for use of the application or a subscription based service for hosted solutions of Microsoft Server products.
- Office 2013 is currently the latest version of the Microsoft Office suite which you can purchase and install on your computer. There are several suites available. The Office Home Student 2013 suite is the cheapest but doesn’t include Outlook. For this, you’ll need Office Home & Business 2013 or Office Professional 2013.
- Office 365 for Business is a subscription based service which provides you with access to hosted solutions of Microsoft Server products which include Exchange (Online), SharePoint and Lync. You can subscribe to these individually or as a package deal. This package deal can also include a license for the latest version of Office which you can install on your computer.
- Office 365 for Home applies to the subscription based version of the latest version of Microsoft Office. It basically is a “hired license”. Currently that is for Microsoft Office 2013 Home Premium (which includes Outlook) or Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 (which also includes Outlook) when you use a Mac instead of a Windows PC. It doesn’t come with an Exchange Online account though but you can configure it with an Outlook.com account or any other POP3, IMAP or Exchange account.
Logging on with an Outlook.com or Microsoft Account
In both Windows 8 and Office 2013, you can now log on with a Microsoft Account as well. This allows you to use it in combination with cloud based services from Microsoft such as OneDrive(formerly known as SkyDrive). It then also stores several settings in the cloud so that these travel with you when you log on to another computer.
All Outlook.com accounts are automatically also Microsoft Accounts but you can turn any other email address into an Microsoft Account as well via: https://signup.live.com.
Signing up won’t turn that email address automatically into an Outlook.com account and you can still use that address as you always did. However, if you want to, you do have the option to use it with Outlook.com as well.
So, you can logon to Windows 8 with an Outlook.com account and logon to Office 2013 with an Outlook.com account but this doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to configure this account in Outlook itself as well. You can use Outlook with any other account that you own as well.
Similarly, you can use your own email address to sign up for a Microsoft Account with which you then can log on to Windows 8 and Office 2013 and use that address within Outlook as you always did or with any other account.
To check your currently configured mail accounts in Outlook 2013 use:
File-> Account Settings-> Account Settings…-> tab E-mail
Find the best email app for iPhone in this curated list (instead of spending hours in the App store fruitlessly trying one worthless email app after the other).
Why the Hunt for Best Email App for iPhone Started Late
When Steve Jobs first presented iPhone in 2007, email was considered a core function.
That meant iPhone came with a built-in email app called Mail. With Mail, you could access your messages everywhere. Mail was a good email program, but it was not a great one.
If you did not like Mail, you could not, for all practical purposes, access your email anywhere: deleting the Mail app was impossible, and one could not install an alternative app for accessing email either. That, you see, would have duplicated a core function.
Too Many Choices? Start Here
Email on the iPhone has come a long way since then.
Mail is a seriously great email app, you can delete it if you want, and the App Store is awash in alternative email applications. Now, of course, the challenge is to find the best email app for your iPhone needs.
This list is sorted from best to good based on personal experience, and it should let you find the best email app for iPhone in no time. By the way, when you delete an included app on an iOS it doesn't really get deleted, but it does make itself invisible.
Outlook for iOS
Outlook App For Macbook
What We Like
Feature-rich app.
Strong community for support.
Frequent updates.
Familiar interface, like the Mac OS version.
What We Don't Like
Can be a resource hog.
Some features cost.
Outlook for iOS is fast. It starts fast. It updates fast. It lets you read, send and file mail — fast. While many email apps for iPhone feels sluggish even with these basics, Outlook for iOS progresses beyond them — fast, and far.
You can search with near-instant results, for instance, a reasonably intelligent inbox lets you see the most important emails first (thus faster), and you can postpone emails with simple swiping. With support for Exchange and IMAP accounts, Outlook for iOS is the best email app for iPhone in an enterprise environment; POP, alas, is not supported.
Like on the desktop, Outlook for iOS comes a calendar, which is simple but functional. Unfortunately, task management is not included. Like on the desktop, you can extend functionality with add-ons, though.
Spark
What We Like
Connect many types of email accounts.
Collaboration tools.
Create email templates.
Several third-party apps.
What We Don't Like
Frequent issues with Exchange Sync.
Free version has feature limitations.
Having the best way to handle email signatures makes giving Spark a try worth it, but there is much more to like.
When you first open Spark, you are presented with an inbox grouped automatically by category (personal, notifications, newsletters and the rest). It may not be as smart as Google Inbox, but Spark's sorting is useful nonetheless. Spark is not only useful but also a pleasure to behold and use: you get one-tap replies, swiping actions (including an option to snooze email) and fast search results (which you can save as smart folders).
Some calendar integration lets you view your schedule and set up events from emails, though neither is as smooth as Spark's email program.
iOS Mail
What We Like
Supported by Apple with frequent updates.
Automatic syncing to Calendar.
Excellent Exchange integration perfect for corporate email.
What We Don't Like
Occasional syncing issues with multiple devices.
Some calendar appointments disappear when sync issues occur.
So says Aristotle. If you believe him — and who would doubt Aristotle? — then iOS Mail is the most natural email program for iPhone.
In lieu of algorithmic classifications, hashed tags and finely grained options, iOS Mail offers simple solutions that are good enough for most needs. You can sort out VIP senders (which you get to define) and file emails to folders, of course; you can compose emails using rich text and swipe to take action fast; most importantly, perhaps, you get beautifully rendered emails without clutter and just about nothing to learn, to find out or to puzzle.
Edison Mail
What We Like
Easy unsubscribe feature for email.
Responsive in syncing.
Track packages, travel, entertainment, and more.
What We Don't Like
Occasional syncing and connection issues.
Cannot mark emails as spam.
Edison Mail's email is not the digital assistant it claims to be; it is a fantastic email program that gets the important things right.
First, the 'assistant' claim: Edison Mail does not offer you the emails you need to see at any time without prompt; it does not reply to messages on its own or even suggest likely text to use. It does, however, suggest recipients based on frequency and can filter and use emails by type — bills, booking and shipment notifications as well as email subscriptions.
For the latter — and here is where the important things have already started going very right — email lets you find all messages fast (search in general is awesomely fast and useful), delete the whole bunch in an instant and unsubscribe with a single tap. When you do read newsletters and marketing emails, email lets you block read receipts. When you want to read later, email offers convenient snoozing; when you tapped Send too fast, email lets you undo.
The Snooze feature is only available for iOS users at this time. That means if you're using Edison mail on Android devices, any snooze settings you've enabled on your iOS device won't sync across platforms. The development team at Edison calls this a 'coming soon' feature, but no specific release date has been provided.
Possibly the most important thing about an email app is, of course, its speed. Edison Mail gets this one very right.
Polymail
What We Like
One tap unsubscribe feature.
Customizable swipe actions.
Schedule when emails are sent.
What We Don't Like
Doesn't work with password management tools.
Mail frequently loads slowly.
Exchange is not supported.
Polymail comes with a host of features from email (and attachment) tracking to scheduling delivery to message templates. If you cannot tell already, Polymail is geared toward the professional. Consequently, some of the features are limited to a subscription service.
Unfortunately, Polymail does not work with Exchange accounts directly yet and supports IMAP only.
No matter the edition and account, Polymail lets you postpone emails for later reading. This, like a few other oft-used function is accessible using a swipe menu whose actions you can customize. The Polymail inbox is always a plain list of emails sorted by date, though: you can filter it to show only unread emails but it never organizes or groups itself.
Airmail
What We Like
Sync across multiple devices.
Easy to configure interface.
Helpful technical support.
What We Don't Like
Email searches are clunky and inaccurate.
Flaky performance with Exchange.
Airmail does everything, it seems, and then some (seriously, try it if you don't believe me). Here's what I mean:
- Turn emails into to-do items or add them to the calendar? At your service!
- Schedule an email to be sent later? Of course (using Exchange and Gmail).
- Organize with folders and labels as you like? Sure.
- Block a sender? Right in the app.
- Undo send? Airmail has you covered for a few seconds.
- Snooze an email? For how long would you like to postpone it?
- Pick actions available from new mail notifications? You bet.
- Add files from cloud storage as attachments? Here you go.
- See an email's full source code? In Courier.
- Lock your email with Touch ID? Thumbs up from Airmail.
In this manner, it goes on and on. Of course, so do menus and options and buttons in Airmail. There is much to do, a lot to tap and plenty to configure. Not everything is as obvious, unfortunately, and there is little explanation to be found. Also, while Airmail does include a smart, filtered inbox, its implementation is not the most elegant, search is unstructured and not all that smart, and Airmail could help more with smart email templates or text snippets.
Yahoo! Mail
What We Like
Works with different email accounts.
Interface is easily to customize.
Coupon feature, easy access to savings.
What We Don't Like
Security issues in the past.
Pay for premium features.
Names and titles can be deceiving at first. Yahoo! Mail is for Yahoo! Mail accounts — and for a few others, too (Gmail, Outlook.com). What is not deceiving about the Yahoo! Mail app for iPhone is the friendly, simple face it presents at first.
Without confusing through a multitude of options and actions, Yahoo! Mail lets you star mail to highlight it, file it in folders, search fast and get your inbox filtered by a handful of useful categories (including people, social updates, and those important travel emails). For sending email, Yahoo! Mail shines with impressive image sending and attachment support as well as its unique and colorful email stationery.
Yahoo! Mail supports Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, and Outlook Mail on the Web.