How To Check Email - Webmail & Email Applications

Email is one of the most widely used forms of communication, so having a professional email address @ your domain is crucial. If you're still using sillyname + randomnumbers@yahoo.com, you may be giving the impression that your company is inexperienced or—even worse—raising doubts as to whether you’re a legitimate company. Take control of your reputation and check out Email Account Setup to learn how to create an email account at your domain.

Once you've created your professional email address, how're you supposed to check your email? You're going to need an email client for that. And what is an email client? Email clients come in two varieties: webmail and email applications.

Webmail

Webmail, or web-based email, is portable and accessible anywhere that has an internet connection because the application that sends and reads your mail is accessed on a website from your browser. Examples of webmail we offer are Roundcube and Horde and can be accessed at fastdomain.com/webmail.

A few advantages of using webmail to access your email are:

• Simplicity. No setup required.
• Portable and accessible anywhere.
• Great if you can’t install software on your work or school computer.
• Save space on your computer; email is stored online.

Webmail Client Comparison

We offer two options for webmail that are built into your account. Each individual email user can choose which webmail client they want to use: Roundcube or Horde.

• Roundcube. As our most popular webmail client, it has the look and feel you’d expect from an email application, but is available inside a browser. You can import and use an address book and use IMAP folders with drag-and-drop organization. When composing emails, you can set up preset responses to save time, and write with spell check in a rich text html composer.
• Horde. It's more than just a webmail client—it’s a collection of simple online apps for collaboration including webmail, calendar, notes, and tasks. These extra features do have some limits, however. For example, the collaborative features only work inside Horde; so to share a calendar entry or a note, the person you're sharing it with would also need to use Horde.

Email Applications

An email application is software installed on your computer or mobile device that is used to read and send email. Your email is stored on your computer, including deleted and sent mail, giving you the ability to manage your email offline. Not everyone needs offline access to their email, but if you do, being able to work from a train or on a long flight without Wi-Fi is definitely an advantage to using an email application. Some common email applications are Outlook, Thunderbird, and Apple Mail.

A few advantages of using an email application are:

• Accessible offline.
• Immediate notifications to your device.
• Manage multiple email addresses in one interface.
• Easily back up your mail and store it on your computer.
• Use advanced mail rules and filtering based on multiple factors, such as words, senders, subjects, headers, etc.

IMAP and POP

When an email is sent, the message is stored on an email server where it waits to be retrieved. Your email application can be set up to retrieve email from the email server using one of two different protocols: IMAP or POP3. The protocol you'll use mostly depends on the number of devices you'll use to access your email.

• IMAP. This is the setting you'll use if you want to access your email on multiple devices or if multiple users access the same account. When you read, reply, delete, forward, or otherwise manage your email, the changes are made on the server and sync with your webmail and other IMAP-connected email clients. IMAP is limited to 20 connections per IP address, but that shouldn't be an issue for most users.


• POP3. If you intend to access your email on only one device, this is the setting for you. Most email clients set up with POP3 will delete the message on the server once it’s been downloaded to your email application. This means that your email application will have the only copy of the email, and it cannot be retrieved again using webmail or another email application. Do not use POP3 if you want to access your email from multiple devices.

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