5 open source alternatives to Gmail

Gmail has enjoyed phenomenal success, and no matter which study you choose to look at for the exact numbers, there’s no question that Gmail is among the top when it comes to market share. For certain circles, Gmail has become synonymous with email, or at least webmail. Many appreciate its clean interface and simple ability to access your inbox from anywhere.

But Gmail is far from the only name in the game when it comes to web-based email clients. . In fact, there are a number of open source alternatives available for those who want more freedom and occasionally a completely different approach to managing their email without relying on a desktop client. You will still need an email server to use with these clients. If you don’t already have a favorite, look for an upcoming article with some options to consider.

Let’s take a look at some of the free and open source webmailers. clients available for you to choose from.

Nextcloud

Nextcloud is often thought of as file-syncing software (like Dropbox), but it’s much more than that. By default, it is a kind of virtual disk in the cloud. Significantly, “the cloud” in this context can be your own server. In addition to being a frontend for your online storage, it has a rich plugin system so you can run web applications for everything from chat to mail.

The mail plugin does not provide a mail server. It’s just a webmail client, but it connects to a variety of mail systems. If you run Nextcloud on a server to which you have sudo or root access, it is possible to set up Postfix or a similar mail server and use the Nextcloud mail application as the interface. Best of all, the developers at Nextcloud have refrained from reinventing the wheel and use libraries from the popular Horde email client.

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Horde

More than just an email client, Horde is a complete enterprise-ready groupware program. The Horde suite is browser-based and includes web applications for reading, sending and organizing emails, managing and sharing calendars, contacts, tasks and notes. In addition, the Horde project provides a PHP framework with libraries and applications to create a custom work environment.

Like the Nextcloud mail application, Horde does not provide a server, so you’ll still need a mail host, or you can run your own. However, Horde offers a robust experience (you can try it yourself on their site) for managing your online life, and its user interface is great on desktop and mobile.

Roundcube

Roundcube is a modern webmail client that is easily installed on a standard LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP). It has a drag-and-drop interface that generally feels modern and snappy, and comes with a host of features: canned responses, spell check, translation into 70+ languages, a template system, tight address book integration and many more. It also has a pluggable API for creating extensions.

Roundcube is available as open source under GPLv3.

Roundcube

Screenshot of Roundcube courtesy of the project website.

Zimbra

The next client on the list is Zimbra, which I have used a lot for work. Zimbra includes a webmail client and an email server, so if you’re looking for an all-in-one solution, it might be a good choice.

Zimbra is a well-maintained project that has been hosted on several different corporate entities over the years, and was acquired by Synacore in 2016. It features most of the things you expect in a modern webmail client, from webmail to folders, contact lists, and a number of pluggable extensions. , and in general it works very well. I have to admit that I’m more familiar with an older version of Zimbra, which felt slow and clunky at times, especially on mobile, but newer versions seem to have overcome these issues and provide a snappy and clean interface regardless of the device you’re on. is using. A desktop client is also available for those who prefer a more native experience. To learn more about Zimbra, check out this article by Zimbra’s Olivier Thierry, who shares much more about Zimbra’s role in the open source community.

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The Zimbra web client is licensed under a Public Attribution license. common and server code is available under GPLv2. S

Zimbra screenshot courtesy of Wikicommons, licensed under CC-BY-SA.

Rainloop

The following is Rainloop. Rainloop is a very modern entry into the field of webmail, and its interface is definitely closer to what you might expect if you’re used to Gmail or another business email client. It comes with most of the features you’d expect, including email address autocompletion, keyboard and drag-and-drop interfaces, filtering support, and many others, and can be easily extended with additional plugins.It integrates with other online accounts like Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Dropbox for a more connected experience, and it also renders HTML email very well compared to other clients I’ve used, which can struggle with complex markup.

It’s easy to install and you can try Rainloop in an online demo to see if it’s right for you.

Rainloop is written primarily in PHP and the community edition is licensed under the AGPL . You can also check the source code on GitHub.

Screenshot of Rainloop by the author.

More options

  • Mailspring supports multiple accounts, confirmations of reading, translations, undo send, and other popular email client features.
  • Cypht is a lightweight email client and newsreader written in PHP and JavaScript and licensed under the GPL v2 license. It has a unique design intended to combine several sources (different email addresses and RSS feeds) into one.
  • Mailpile is an HTML 5 email client, written in Python and available under the AGPL. Mailpile focuses on speed and privacy.
  • WebMail Lite is a modern but minimalist option, AGPL licensed and written primarily in PHP. It’s feature-rich (it can even integrate OpenGPG) but easy to install.
  • SquirrelMail describes itself as “webmail for nuts”. It is lightweight and easy to install, and has been around since 1999.
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This is not an exhaustive list. What is your favorite open source webmail client?

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in 2015 and has been updated to reflect changes in available software options.

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