Catalina Mail.app replacements?

[MacInWin]

OK, with 10.15.1 out and all my software that I need at 64-bit, I went ahead and moved to Catalina. All is well, but the changes in Mail are really annoying. I used to use "Classic" view, one line per email, with the From and Subject showing in a column view and with the highlighted message shown in a window below. The columns could be selected to show or not, and the size could be adjusted to preferences. No more. No more Classic view, and in the columns view, no option to select what to see or how wide the columns will be. In addition there is a totally useless black box on each line that says "To" and nothing else. But it doesn't show for all messages and does not seem to be tied to any given account. In other words, the "To" is random, but most messages have it.

So I went looking for a replacement mail handler. Went to the MAS, didn't see anything close. Tried Spark, but it's even worse in display. Ditto for Outlook, which I have to use for my church email functions. What I want is something simple, like Mail used to be--one line per message, preview below the list, columns selectable and adjustable. Does such a beast exist?

 

[MacInWin]

OK, got rid of the "To" box. Apparently it will show if the email is "To" or "Cc" for you. But you can get rid of it in the top bar menu of Mail under View. Still can't size columns, but it's less annoying now. I have no idea why Apple decided to screw with this. Mail was pretty good as it was.

Other than that, Catalina 10.15.1 seems to be pretty solid so far.

 

[chscag]

Hi Jake:

Yeah, I installed 10.15.1 today on my bootable Catalina SSD thinking that the Mail App would be fixed. No go. It's actually worse now than it was with 10.15. You're not alone about the Classic view being gone and the column problem. Lots of folks over at MacRumors have commented about it.

I'm not sure which Mail app to suggest.... I've used Thunderbird Mail before and liked the layout but it's very different from the Apple Mail app. Don't know if you'll like it, but it's free.

 

[MacInWin]

My wife uses TB. I may go that way. For now, I'm slightly less annoyed now that the useless "To" is gone.

 

[Rod]

Wow Jake, I haven't used Classic View for so long I forgot it was still an option in the previous version of Mail. Mind you I abandoned Mail about 6 years ago and opted for AirMail which is not a free app. It served me well for most of that time until Bloop adopted a by subscription business model for their iOS app at which point I jumped ship. I cannot recall if it had a classic view. To each their own though.

Have a look here; THE 10 BEST Email Client Apps for Mac in 2019
Both Nylas Mail and Airmail seem to suggest that a "classic" view, like Outlook is possible.

 

[Rod]

I take it this is not the view of Mail that you want?

Just filling with Mail, I know its in Dark Mode but I assume this is not what you are after?

 

[Rod]

For some reason this is the largest image I can post. ???

 

[MacInWin]

Rod, that is possibly the worst display for Mail, IMHO. You are correct, that is definitely what I do NOT want.

 

[ferrarr]

Rod, that is possibly the worst display for Mail, IMHO. You are correct, that is definitely what I do NOT want.

Can you post a screen shot of what you do want?

 

[Randy B. Singer]

So I went looking for a replacement mail handler.

I don't know which of these might be precisely what you are looking for, but there are lots of choices for e-mail programs:

GyazMail ($18)
GyazMail -- An all-new email client for Mac OS X --
Extremely similar to the classic Apple Mail!

Canary ($20) both Mac and iOS versions
Canary Mail - Best Email App for Mac & iOS with PGP Encryption
***Does encrypted mail.*** works well with Exchange and IMAP

AirMail ($27)
Airmail - Lightning Fast Mail Client for Mac and iPhone
Airmail 3 on the Mac App Store
Review:
Review: Airmail, an exceedingly pretty but Gmail-centric alternative to Apple Mail - 9to5Mac
AirMail will connect to an Exchange server!

Postbox ($40 for a lifetime license)
http://www.postbox-inc.com/
Review:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/09/0...ok-mac-mail-with-smarter-faster-email-client/
(This seems to be the consensus most popular alternative to Mail.)

MailMate ($50)
(IMAP only)
http://freron.com/
Review:
http://www.macdrifter.com/2013/11/mailmate-explorations.html
listserv:
http://lists.freron.com/listinfo/mailmate
(Lots of previous Eudora users say good things about this program.)

Mail Pilot (monthly fee)
(IMAP only)
https://mailpilothq.com/
Review:
http://www.macworld.com/article/209...charts-a-course-for-maximum-productivity.html

Inky (several versions-subscription)
(IMAP only)
http://inky.com/
Review:
http://techcrunch.com/2012/12/27/inky-plans-to-reinvent-email-for-real-this-time/
Inky (paid version) will connect to an Exchange server!
Uses encryption for high security

Unibox ($14)
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unibox/id702816521
https://www.uniboxapp.com/

 

[pine man]

I must confess I didn't notice any difference with Mail after the update to Catalina This is how mine looks.



I have Office 365 so occasionally I run Outlook but it's a lot slower than Mail.

 

[IWT]

Just to make a minor point: The "To" and "CC" options have been present as an option (not default) at least as far back as Sierra.



Ian

 

[ferrarr]

There are also the options in the View menu,



I don't remember what the classic View looks like? Was it a top/bottom display?

Edit: If you turn off Show Side Preview, you get the top/bottom display again?

 

[pine man]

Still can't size columns

Unless I'm missing something, all of the columns can be dragged to size.

 

[MacInWin]

OK, I spent about 20 minutes crafting a post, only to have it totally disappear. Oh, well, here it is, much less well composed:



That is what I have now. It is called "Use Column Layout" under the View column. Bob, if you look at Post #12, you can see where "Classic" view used to be, but it's gone. In Classic view one could size the columns by dragging the boundary in the header bar. No more header bar, so no more dragging column sizes. In the old Classic view one could select what to show. No more. All you get to pick are whether or not to show the Date (default is time only), whether or not to show To/CC (default is to show), and whether or not to show message size. I don't need/want the blue dot for unread messages as unread messages are in bold font, I don't need to know I'm in the Inbox-Pobox because the sidebar shows me that (I didn't put in the sidebar because the website here now limits to 500 pixels in the images and it was fuzzy enough without the sidebar included when I shrank it down.) Bottom line, the display is now less functional and useful than it used to be. You can see the top of the selected message in the bottom. That is adjustable up and down. At least something remains!

Pine Man, your display is the default, which I definitely don't want. Wasted space is an anathema when you get as much email as I do. I want a tight, compact display of as much about the mail as I can get.

Randy, thanks for the tips, I'll take a look at them.

 

[Rod]

As usual really informative stuff Randy.


Sent from my iPad using Mac-Forums

 

[Rod]

I know this is a little off topic but despite the eye opening range of email clients listed by Randy only one of them is available on both macOS and iOS platforms. Gyaz Mail looks really interesting to me and a lot of the features included on others are real deal breakers. Everything from end to end encryption to attachment directories with icon views, people centric sorting focus and media sharing compatibility.
All great features I’m sure but if I can’t use the same app on all my devices the deal is off. I want to know that if I create a custom mail box on one device it will be mirrored on all the others. I don’t want to have to learn how to operate two completely different apps on three different devices. This was one of the reasons I went with and stayed with AirMail for so long. After giving the rather lightweight Spark a good run for its money I’m really considering going back to it.


Sent from my iPad using Mac-Forums

 

[Rod]

Jake it’s funny how no one discusses this sort of stuff prior to macOS upgrades. They go on about so called improvements but don’t really tell us about the small often important changes to core apps that seem to have been decided by 16 year olds who never used some features so decide they’re unnecessary. My wife was fine about the iTunes changes but was horrified when I mentioned just in passing that there would be no Dashboard. It turns out she used it a lot.

 

[MacInWin]

Yeah, I miss Dashboard, too. I used it a lot, but knew it was going away. I had some really useful widgets there and have a nicely developed habit of using them. Having to adjust to lesser quality and harder to invoke apps. Ah, well, I will learn.

 

[badshoehabit]

Try Thunderbird - clean, lots of options.