Imap or Pop3

[Darryl Richey]

A quick question.
Do more people on here use IMAP or POP3 and why?
Trying to decide if I should change to IMAP. As I understand it Imap is a little slower because it has to pull all emails from the server everytime you open up email? I don't get a lot of emails, but I'm trying to find an email app that I can simply make a saved folder, but it seems like with everything you have to be using Imap instead of Pop3.?.

Darryl

 

[Cloppy]

Pop3 is more common I think. As for speed and secruity im not sure which one is better.

Pop3 downloads a copy of all the messages and either deletes them all from the server or leaves a copy. Depends on your client config.

Imap deletes the email directly and only downloads the headers until you click to get the full message.

 

[mwhartman]

I've never worried about the protocol because they both have advantages and disadvantages. What provided do you use currently and are they meeting your needs? If not, then look around.

 

[takeshi]

Do more people on here use IMAP or POP3 and why?

Probably POP3 simply because it's much more common. You can't really sync with POP accounts though. You should consider your needs and what your email provider can offer rather than what's most common around here.

 

[csimo]

A quick question.
Do more people on here use IMAP or POP3 and why?
Trying to decide if I should change to IMAP. As I understand it Imap is a little slower because it has to pull all emails from the server everytime you open up email? I don't get a lot of emails, but I'm trying to find an email app that I can simply make a saved folder, but it seems like with everything you have to be using Imap instead of Pop3.?.

Darryl

There are many different ways to configure both POP3 and IMAP, but IMAP has significant advantages.

For example if I send you a 10MB picture attached to a message. With IMAP it only downloads the message headers so you could see that I sent you a message with a large picture attached, but the actual picture would not be downloaded unless you opened the message. With POP3 the entire message, including the picture, will be downloaded every time. So if you get a lot of large messages IMAP can be a lot faster than POP3.

If your phone is your primary email client then POP3 might make sense, but generally IMAP is a newer and more robust protocol that gives you options that POP3 does not.

In general IMAP stores messages on the email server. POP3 stores messages on the email client (your phone).

Use IMAP when possible.

-Joe

 

[Darryl Richey]

Thanks folks. With a little research with my internet provider it turns out they don't support IMAP, only POP3 so I guess I don't have a choice what to use. I just thought they would support both. It's disappointing to see that you can't use Touchdown with POP.

Darryl

 

[csimo]

Thanks folks. With a little research with my internet provider it turns out they don't support IMAP, only POP3 so I guess I don't have a choice what to use. I just thought they would support both. It's disappointing to see that you can't use Touchdown with POP.

Darryl

I'm not saying you're wrong, but it would be VERY unusual that a mail server wouldn't support IMAP. Since every mail server supports IMAP that means your ISP would have to disable it.

-Joe

 

[Darryl Richey]

Joe,
You were right. I was looking into it in the wrong place. I got things changed over to imap, but I'm not sure how to make the setting changes on my phone.?

Darryl

 

[csimo]

On your phone you will have to delete the old POP3 account and set up a new account as IMAP. I don't think there's any way to change an existing account.

Good luck,
-Joe

 

[Darryl Richey]

Again thanks Joe. Got it all straightened out. This forum sure helps the dummies like me.
Darryl

 

[harrellj]

One thing to think about as well, gmail can access other mail servers via POP3 and it does support IMAP (which is how I get around the measly 20MB limit my ISP gives for email accounts). It also will allow you to send a message out as if i was from that original POP3 account.

 

[Darryl Richey]

Something I'm worried about with Imap is if i recieve a email and read it, then close out the email, if I need that email later but don't have service I can't pull it up again since they are only on the server correct? If I put them into a folder such as "work", does that then save it to my phone?

Darryl

 

[csimo]

Something I'm worried about with Imap is if i recieve a email and read it, then close out the email, if I need that email later but don't have service I can't pull it up again since they are only on the server correct? If I put them into a folder such as "work", does that then save it to my phone?

Darryl

No, once you open and read the message a copy of the message data is downloaded to the phone. So a copy of the message remains on the server and your phone. Best of both worlds.

-Joe

 

[Darryl Richey]

Again thanks all. I have it all set up with imap on K9email and so far I'm very pleased. It's doing the little things that I wanted. You folks are great with all the help for some of us tech weenies.

Darryl