Outspring Mail - a New, Still-In-Beta Email Client for Mac OSX

For whatever reason, I haven't been entirely happy with any email client I've used since before 2000. The last program I can remember really liking was back in the days before OS X, when I used to use, and enjoy using, a program called Claris Emailer. Claris was, at times, either a company run by Apple or owned by Apple or later made part of Apple. Regardless, it was one of my favorite email programs, but it never quite made it to OS X.

And to be honest, I couldn't even tell you (now), what it was exactly that I liked about it. Regardless, in the years since then, I've used Apple's Mail.app, Thunderbird, Correo, Eudora, Entourage, GyazMail, GnuMail, Musashi, Outlook Express, and more. There are a ton of things I like about them, but I've never really one that made feel "at home" enough to stop looking.

So I was pleased when, the other day, I saw notice that a new email client is coming for Mac OSX. The name of the program is Outspring Mail. The name of the company didn't ring a bell with me at first, but when I went to their website, I saw they had also come up with the QuickMail email program (another program I've used in the past and liked). Outspring Mail is still in beta (it hasn't even reached 1.0 status yet), but from what I can see, it's well on its way to being an excellent client.

For the most part, Outspring Mail is pretty much what you'd expect from a modern email client. It supports POP, IMAP, SMPT and other standard email protocols. It includes spam filtering, auto-completion of email addresses, has either a 3-pane interface (typical for email clients) or a 3-column vertical layout (for those with widescreen monitors), and is able to update itself.

It also supports virtual mailboxes, so if you have a bunch of different email addresses, you can combine them into one "meta" mailbox. For instance, there's no need to first check each address's inbox... just click on "INBOX" and see all the messages, from all the accounts' inboxes.