Ask HN: Best Email client for Linux?

3 points by smarky ↗ HN
I need something with GMail support for a university account. I have been using Thunderbird, but I would like something actively in development.

7 comments

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I use thunderbird, but I have fond memories of Evolution. It is way faster than thunderbird.

Claws-mail is pretty good too, if you need something light yet functional.

When you say "with GMail support" I assume that you mean "Handles IMAP".

As you say Thunderbird seems stalled, but despite that it continues to work. So are there specific annoyances you have with it? Or think you'd like added/changed?

Most of the big (graphical) mail-clients are very similar in terms of featuresets, if you ignore the GUI toolokit and similar distractions.

I personally prefer console mail-reading, for many years I used mutt, but then I started to get annoyed that I couldn't script it terribly well. So I wrote my own mail-client, console-based, modal, and scripted with Lua. It works for me, and even has IMAP support, but I suspect it is not so useful for you:

https://lumail.org/

https://github.com/lumail/lumail/

IMO, Gmail isn’t really IMAP. It’s more like kinda semi sorta MAP.

You can’t ever delete mail from gmail. Only hide it, at best.

Gmail only ever has one folder, into which everything gets thrown.

You could use Geary, Evolution, mutt.
I use claws-mail. Not exactly fancy but it's fast, stable, and can handle several GB of data in inboxes even in slow machines without a hiccup.

My second option, beacuse of the features it offers, would be Kmail/Kontact.