There is an abundance of email clients for iPhone and iPad out there today. Just a quick scan of the keyword “email” on the App Store will result in countless results of apps with various features.
Airmail added themselves to the group when it was released earlier this week. Coming from the amazing desktop client, I had high expectations for the iPhone version.
We all get emails every day and there is no way around it. However, we can control the way we consume it. I’ve used many email apps out there such at the native Mail client, Spark, Mailbox (RIP), Google Inbox, Outlook, and many more. Those are great applications but there were quirks for each one. Mailbox was the best in my opinion and since its demise, I have been on the hunt for a replacement.
I wanted something simple (easier said than done) and could handle the countless emails I get every day. In part, the native email app IS simple but it doesn’t handle email very good. The wipe gestures are confusing and not intuitive and it doesn’t have push notifications for IMAP accounts.
So when I got an email saying Airmail was released, I was happy but at the same time skeptical especially with the $4.99 price tag. I know $4.99 isn’t much given a lot of people spend that on coffee/food every single day but I didn’t want to be disappointed.
On first glance, Airmail does everything an app does on iOS 9—pop and peek, swipe gestures, etc. As you dig deeper, there isn’t a single feature that stands out and that is the key. It doesn’t combine your to-do’s like Google Inbox or your calendar like Outlook.
The app lets you customize it however you want without all the bells and whistles because, in the end, it’s just an email app. You can change the colors of each account in the unified inbox, show icons for each sender, change each swipe gesture, choose default browsers, etc. Airmail can also integrate with 3rd party apps like Dropbox, Box, Google Drive, Trello, Wunderlist, octet, Fantastical, and many many more (swipes can be customized to bring up actions for 3rd apps).
If you are already using Airmail on the desktop, you have the option to import the email accounts already on there to your iPhone. You just need to enter your password for each account but you wouldn’t have to deal with entering SMTP servers and all that jazz again. Email signatures import over as well.
Another benefit of using both the desktop and iPhone clients is that snoozed messages will be sync and show up on both platforms. This is a great way to streamline the feature if you use it often.
If you have an Apple Watch, you can set up the way you interact with messages when they come in such as archiving it, marking as spam, done, read, starring it, and sending it to the trash.
Airmail’s UI isn’t complex, nor is it new. However, they’ve made a simple email app that’s accessible and easy to use. Furthermore, its users can change to its liking thanks to a lot of the available customization. I’ve been using it all week and it’s my email app of choice so far and hopefully, it’ll get better and better from here and hoping we’ll see an iPad app soon as well.
Airmail can be downloaded in the Mac Store for $9.99 and in the iTunes App Store for $4.99.