Mimestream is the Mac app every Gmail user needs

Crucial factor I can inform you about Mimestream, the e-mail app for Mac that simply came out of a yearslong beta, is that it lastly made me cease going to Gmail.com. 

I’ve tried loads of e-mail apps over time, they usually all have a minimum of one deadly flaw. (Some have a number of.) Search is the most typical wrongdoer: only a few apps can search by means of messages as quick or in addition to Gmail, which is why I’ve dumped every little thing from Spark to Edison to Apple Mail to Newton over time. However some apps have a tough time discovering contacts, others do weird stuff with inbox organization, and don’t even get me began on those that appear by some means unable to remain on-line and truly ship all my messages. For years, I’ve downloaded apps hoping for higher, extra native e-mail instruments than Gmail’s cluttered mess of an interface, and for years, I’ve ended up begrudgingly returning to the cluttered mess. 

Mimestream is completely different. The app, created by a small group led by Neil Jhaveri, does nearly every little thing Gmail does a minimum of in addition to Gmail does it. (Jhaveri is a former Apple engineer who spent a bunch of years engaged on Mail and Notes. Man is aware of his apps.) In lots of circumstances, that’s as a result of it does it precisely the way in which Gmail does it — Mimestream makes heavy use of Gmail’s personal API for every little thing from mail retrieval to go looking. 

In a means, Mimestream isn’t actually an e-mail app as a result of it doesn’t do IMAP and POP3 and all the usual e-mail app stuff. It’s a Gmail app. It doesn’t even assist Outlook or different e-mail suppliers but as a result of Jhaveri and his group have been so targeted on constructing a greater approach to do Gmail. (He says they’re engaged on Outlook assist, although.) As an alternative of all of the sidebars and tabs and advertisements and autoreply ideas, Mimestream simply offers you your e-mail. Your inbox on the left, your open message on the best. It appears extra like Apple Mail than Gmail. It’s quick, it’s clear, it’s not terribly visually thrilling — however that’s most likely for the very best on the subject of e-mail.

I’ve been testing the app for greater than a yr, and there’s nothing about Gmail I miss. Mimestream carries over the identical keyboard shortcuts, the identical labels and filters, the identical every little thing. Its search is quick and wonderful — as a result of it’s simply Gmail’s personal search offered in a brand new means. Mimestream has the undo ship function that has saved me numerous instances, it helps all my e-mail aliases, it lets me reply to calendar invitations. In nearly each means, it does Gmail a lot better than Gmail.

That mentioned, there are many issues I’d wish to see Mimestream add, beginning with Home windows and cellular apps. I additionally want Mimestream made it simpler to hyperlink to an e-mail — proper now, you may copy the hyperlink to any message, however that hyperlink then simply opens Gmail when it truly should open Mimestream. It should assist Outlook and different suppliers, too, particularly if it desires to be individuals’s essential e-mail consumer. And Mimestream will finally want a approach to replicate Gmail’s plug-in construction as a result of there are loads of energy customers who gained’t wish to ditch Boomerang or Mailtrack.

Jhaveri says Mimestream is engaged on loads of that stuff. Finally, certainly one of his targets is to promote Mimestream licenses to companies, which makes supporting plug-ins and Outlook all of the extra necessary. He’s additionally satisfied Mimestream Cell might be nice.

Within the meantime, Jhaveri figures the primary finest use case for Mimestream is individuals who have a number of Gmail accounts. You possibly can add all of your accounts to Mimestream and both flip by means of your particular person inboxes or see all of them in a unified record. Mimestream additionally helps Gmail’s inbox classes, so you may see your Promotions and Updates individually in case you favor. 

You possibly can handle it even additional, too: you probably have a bunch of labor addresses or a couple of completely different emails you employ for private stuff, you may group these underneath what Mimestream calls “Profiles” and see all of your associated messages collectively.

Mimestream additionally does some helpful Mac-specific stuff that you could’t get from the Gmail internet app, like integrating with Focus Filters and the native notification system to be able to have one profile ship alerts through the workday and one other accomplish that on the weekends.

Mimestream has some particular common particular person enchantment, however it’s priced very very like a instrument for companies and energy customers. It’s a subscription app and can price $50 a yr or $5 a month, although you may get your first yr for $30 through the launch. That’s lots to pay for a better-looking Gmail! It’s nowhere close to the $30 a month price for a service like Superhuman, although, and it’s consistent with different productiveness apps like Fantastical or Todoist. Different e-mail apps, equivalent to Spark Premium, are about the identical worth, too. A couple of dollars a month, Jhaveri reckons, is a good worth for a greater e-mail life. However finally, for a lot of customers, Mimestream is competing with free. And free is tough to beat.

Personally, I’ll be paying for the annual subscription with out a lot second thought. I spend hours a day in my e-mail, and it’s the supply of a lot of the knowledge I want minute to minute and daily. As Gmail continues to be overrun by advertisements, Meet icons, and have creep, I’m pleased paying a couple of dollars a month for a greater reply. Mimestream is the very best of Gmail, minus the worst of Gmail. That’s the app I’ve been searching for.