What is the difference between IMAP and POP3?
When setting up your mailbox in your email client, you must decide whether you want to access the mailbox via POP3 or IMAP. These are different protocols by which the email client communicates with the mail server.
IMAP stands for “Internet Message Access Protocol”. When accessing via IMAP, messages remain on the server and are actively synchronized with each connection. Depending on the configuration of your email program, your sent emails can also be synchronized on the server. Emails you delete in your email program are also directly deleted on the server with IMAP.
The biggest advantage of IMAP access is that you can access your data from multiple devices, for example from a home PC and at the office or when you are on the go with your phone. A disadvantage is that depending on the extent of your email traffic, you need to monitor your mailbox storage space and possibly regularly delete emails you no longer need so that the mailbox is not blocked by overload. With a slow internet connection, especially with a large mailbox, synchronization problems can also occur when accessing via IMAP.
POP3 stands for “Post Office Protocol”. When accessing via POP3, your email client downloads your emails directly from the server and then stores them locally on your device. This is advantageous if you have a very large volume of emails, as local data retention prevents the mailbox from filling up. A disadvantage can be that the data is only stored on one device, which means that after downloading your data, you can no longer access it from different devices. This is not recommended, for example, when it comes to a business mailbox that several employees need to access.
hosting.fr mailboxes support both access protocols. The choice of access protocol when setting up your email client determines the advanced settings, such as the port to use. For more information on this, you can refer to the support article titled “What are the names of the IMAP, POP3, and SMTP servers?” as well as the illustrated setup guides for the most common email clients.