Roger Talks Tech

Making the tech in your life work for you

You are here: Home / Apps / Apps - Productivity / Postbox – a Powerful Alternative to Apple Mail

Postbox – a Powerful Alternative to Apple Mail

by

Postbox icon

While Apple’s Mail application (Mail.app) is a favorite of many, there are plenty of people who are not fans of the application and look for an alternative, especially after the initial release of Mavericks where there was a major issue with using Gmail (the issue has since then been resolved). There are no shortage of e-mail applicaitons available as alternatives. One of my personal favorites is Postbox by Postbox-inc.

Migration

The account migration manager made it a snap to import my IMAP accounts and email from Mail.app into Postbox. Postbox offers a unified Inbox named All Accounts which many other e-mail programs lack.

But by far, my favorite feature of Postbox is its Gmail integration.

Gmail Labels

Adding a Gmail label is quick and easy: click the Gear Icon on the top right corner of the message window, point to Assign Label and choose the label you want to apply to the message. Repeat to add more than one label. To view your labels, click your Gmail account in the ACCOUNTS area and then click the disclosure triangle to expand the Inbox folder under the Folders area. A list of all your labels is displayed.

Assign gmail labels in postbox image

Gmail shortcuts

Postbox also supports Gmail shortcuts, which is a huge feature for people coming from Gmail. Yes, those same keyboard shortcuts that you use in the Web version of Gmail work in Postbox.

Additional Gmail support includes the ability to add dates to your Google Calendar, dedicated Important view, and the ability to send and archive your messages in one step.

Postbox Topics

Postbox Topics is a feature that allows you to organize your messages by keywords. To add a topic, click the Gear Icon on the top right corner of the message window and click Assign Topic to display the Topic window (You can also right-click a message, point to Assign Topic and then choose the desired Topic). To add a new topic, type the name of the topic in the text box and press Return or enter.

Add a topic to a message in Postbox image

Import to Evernote

Postbox include built-in Evernote support, allowing you to import your messages to Evernote with one click of your mouse. If you use Evernote, you’ll love this feature! Postbox Topics are automatically added as Evernote Tags and if the message contains any file attachments, they are imported as well.

Convert Postbox messages to Evernote

Instead of e-mailing large files, you can simply drag files from your Dropbox folder to the message area (not the attachment area) of a message, which will insert them as links. This is a real time-saver if you e-mail out a lot of Dropbox files.

Postbox To-Dos

Creating To-Dos in Postbox image

Postbox comes with a built-in To Do list manager to help keep you on task. You can pin your to-dos to the top of your messages list as well as combine your To-Do view with the Unifield Inbox view. Choose View > To-Dos from the menu to display your To-Do list. If you are on the lookout for a To-Do list manager, you might find this feature especially helpful.

Postbox To dos appear at top of message pane image

Canned Responses

If you send out the same or similar message repeatedly such as a request for information or product pricing, then you’ll appreciate the Canned Responses feature. What this does, is allows you to create new messages or reply to existing messages using templates that you create.

To create a Canned Response, choose Postbox ➪ Preferences from the menu, click the Composition icon on top of the screen and then click the Responses tab. Click the plus (+) symbol to create a new response. To use a response that you created, click the Responses icon on top of the message window and choose the response you want to use.

Create canned responses in Postbox image

Many More Features

There are many more features available in Postbox that truly render this a powerful application. To view all of the features, visit their feature Web page at: http://postbox-inc.com/features. The best part, is that this application costs only $9.95 which is a real deal for such a feature-rich e-mail client.

How about you? What is your favorite e-mail client for the Mac?

Similar Posts:

Comments

  2. The default mail app is OK but not excellent. I am using “Sparrow” mail app but sad google acquired and killed it. No updates since google bought it. Will give postbox a try. thanks roger.

    Robin.

    • I used to use Sparrow as well and really liked it. Too bad it turned out to be abandonware. I do like Postbox a lot — it has pretty much replaced the Mail app for me.

Recent Comments