Microsoft Outlook is a personal information manager software system from Microsoft, available as a part of the Microsoft 365 software suites. Primarily popular as an email client for businesses, Outlook also includes functions such as calendaring, task managing, contact managing, note-taking, journal logging, web browsing, and RSS news aggregation.
Microsoft Entourage is a discontinued e-mail client and personal information manager that was developed by Microsoft for Mac OS 8.5 and later. Microsoft first released Entourage in October 2000 as part of the Microsoft Office 2001 office suite; Office 98, the previous version of Microsoft Office for the classic Mac OS included Outlook Express 5. The last version was Entourage: Mac 2008, part of Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac, released on January 15, 2008. Entourage was replaced by Outlook for Macintosh in Microsoft Office for Mac 2011, released on October 26, 2010.
The following tables compare general and technical features of notable non-web-based email client programs.
Outlook on the web is a personal information manager web app from Microsoft. It is a web-based version of Microsoft Outlook, and is included in Exchange Server and Exchange Online
Kolab is a free and open source groupware suite. It consists of the Kolab server and a wide variety of Kolab clients, including KDE PIM-Suite Kontact, Roundcube web frontend, Mozilla Thunderbird and Mozilla Lightning with SyncKolab extension and Microsoft Outlook with proprietary Kolab-Connector PlugIns.
Push email is an email system that provides an always-on capability, in which when new email arrives at the mail delivery agent (MDA), it is immediately, actively transferred (pushed) by the MDA to the mail user agent (MUA), also called the email client, so that the end-user can see incoming email immediately. This is in contrast with systems that check for new incoming mail every so often, on a schedule. Email clients include smartphones and, less strictly, IMAP personal computer mail applications.
The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of notable webmail providers who offer a web interface in English.
DeltaSync was a proprietary Microsoft communications protocol for synchronizing web services with offline clients. It was switched off by Microsoft on 30 June 2016.
Windows Live Mail is a discontinued freeware email client from Microsoft. It was the successor to Windows Mail in Windows Vista, which was the successor to Outlook Express in Windows XP and Windows 98. Windows Live Mail is designed to run on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, but is also compatible with Windows 8 and Windows 10, even though Microsoft bundles a new email client, named Windows Mail, with the latter. In addition to email, Windows Live Mail also features a calendar, an RSS feed reader, and a Usenet newsreader.
Outlook.com, formerly Hotmail, is a free personal email service offered by Microsoft. This includes a webmail interface featuring mail, calendaring, contacts, and tasks services. Outlook can also be accessed via email clients using the IMAP or POP protocols.
eM Client is a desktop email client for Windows and macOS. Its functions include sending and receiving email, managing calendars, tasks, contacts, notes, and chat. It was originally released in 2007 and still receives regular updates as of May 2024. Versions for Android and iOS were released in 2024.
Mailbird is a desktop email client for Microsoft Windows and MacOS, compatible with Windows 10 and Windows 11, and with Ventura or higher for Mac devices. Mailbird is offered via a paid subscription, but also includes a free version for both Windows and Mac users.
Newton is an email management application for iOS, Android, MacOS, Windows and ChromeOS developed by CloudMagic, Inc. The application is known for its searching capabilities, cross-platform abilities and user interface. It has been referred to as an email client better than Gmail's native app. As from September 15, 2016, CloudMagic has been renamed to Newton Mail with premium services, adding a host of new features and functions.
Mail was an email client developed by Microsoft and included in Windows Vista and later versions of Windows. It is available as the successor to Outlook Express, which was either included with, or released for Internet Explorer 3.0 and later versions of Internet Explorer. It is set to be replaced by Outlook for Windows.
Alto Mail was a multi-service email client and proprietary email intelligence engine built to analyze and restructure incoming emails and calendar events by Oath Inc. It supported IMAP email providers like Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud, and AOL Mail, as well as email providers using Microsoft Exchange. The centerpiece of the Alto email app was the Dashboard, which acted as a hub where information from multiple inboxes and integrated Calendars was displayed. The information was analyzed and then delivered in the forms of “Cards”, which allowed users to view snapshots of important emails and events ranging from travel details to shopping information, as well as mapping and ride service support for upcoming calendar events. Alto Mail had integration with other popular productivity technology such as Slack, and the Amazon Echo, providing Alexa support for linked accounts.
Nylas Mail is an open-source desktop email client by Nylas, known for its emphasis on user-contributed extensions. It was formerly known as Nylas N1 and was rebranded as Nylas Mail starting with the January 17, 2017 release.
Kopano is an open-source groupware application suite originally based on Zarafa. The initial version of Kopano Core (KC) was forked from the then-current release of Zarafa Collaboration Platform, and superseded ZCP in terms of lineage as ZCP switched to maintenance mode with patches flowing from KC. Kopano WebApp similarly descended from Zarafa WebApp. Since October 2017, Kopano Core is also known more specifically as Kopano Groupware Core, since Kopano B.V. developed more products that were not directly requiring groupware components.
Hiri was a business focused desktop e-mail client for sending and receiving e-mails, managing calendars, contacts, and tasks. It was developed as an alternative to existing e-mail clients and calendar applications such as Microsoft Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird.
The JSON Meta Application Protocol (JMAP) is a set of related open Internet Standard protocols for handling email. JMAP is implemented using JSON APIs over HTTP and has been developed as an alternative to IMAP/SMTP and proprietary email APIs such as Google's Gmail and Microsoft's MAPI . Additional protocols and data models being built on top of the core of JMAP for handling contacts and calendar synchronization are meant to be potential replacements for CardDAV and CalDAV, and other support is currently in the works.
Microsoft 365 is a product family of productivity software, collaboration and cloud-based services owned by Microsoft. It encompasses online services such as Outlook.com, OneDrive, Microsoft Teams, programs formerly marketed under the name Microsoft Office, and enterprise products and services associated with these products such as Exchange Server, SharePoint, and Viva Engage. Microsoft 365 also covers subscription plans encompassing these products, including those that include subscription-based licenses to desktop and mobile software, and hosted email and intranet services.
