this post was submitted on 14 Dec 2025
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I'm setting up my Nextcloud server and am at the point of needing to connect an email server. I'm not interested in selfhosting an email server (not yet anyway), and I don't particularly like Proton as my current email provider (which was what I migrated to when de-Googling my life).

What email providers do y'all like that aren't run by shady tech bros and are easy to integrate with your other selfhosted services?

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[–] anticonnor@lemmy.world 24 points 1 month ago

I want to thank everyone who replied. I did some research on most of these and think PurelyMail is the winner for me. Feel free to correct me if I got some details wrong. I want to give a shoutout to @mbirth for mentioning Disroot, which looks like a really interesting experiment in federated services.

Also, I know this post is really bending the rules for c/selfhosted, but connecting your selfhosted services to an email provider is essential, and having a reliable and affordable email provider just makes this weird hobby of ours a little easier.

My Rating (1-5) Service Website Annual Cost Only Email?
5 PurelyMail https://purelymail.com/ $10, pay for added storage Yes
4 MXRoute https://mxroute.com/ $50/year small plan Yes
4 Disroot https://disroot.org/ Free, pay to add storage and domains Yes, separated from other Disroot services
3 Fastmail https://www.fastmail.com/ $60 individual plan Yes-ish
3 Mailo https://www.mailo.com/ ~$14 premium plan No
3 Proton https://mail.proton.me/ $48/year plus plan $120/year unlimited plan No
2 Mailbox.org https://mailbox.org/ ~$14 light plan ~$42 standard Light plan
2 Migadu https://migadu.com/ $90 mini plan Yes
1 GMX https://www.gmx.com/mail/ Free, ad supported No
[–] maj@piefed.social 21 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Have a look at posteo. Gives you IMAP so you can use any client. Its only €1 a month and is supposed to be good with privacy. Have had no complaints so far. https://posteo.de/en

[–] JASN_DE@feddit.org 3 points 1 month ago

Seconded. Works really well for me.

[–] nbailey@lemmy.ca 20 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Fastmail. It’s been around forever and it just works. And they don’t do anything weird with SMTP/IMAP.

mailbox dot org is also pretty good, but I wasn’t a fan of their 2FA implementation.

[–] conrad82@lemmy.world 10 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

When did you try mailbox.org last? they improved 2FA this year. It is now TOTP + possibility to make application passwords. Finally works great!

https://kb.mailbox.org/en/private/security-and-privacy/how-to-use-two-factor-authentication-2fa/

[–] nbailey@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 month ago

Ah very nice, good to hear they addressed that. It was the only real deciding factor last time I moved my mail around ~2 yrs ago

[–] 418_im_a_teapot@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 month ago

Plus, if you are a 1Password user, it integrates to give you randomly generated email addresses.

https://1password.com/fastmail/

https://www.fastmail.com/features/masked-email/

[–] fizzle@quokk.au 3 points 1 month ago

Fastmail is probably the best, but their pricing is egregious.

I was with them for a decade or so but with a large archive of emails and multiple users i couldn't justify the cost.

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[–] irmadlad@lemmy.world 12 points 1 month ago

I been using mailo.com for years now. It's a small EU business that's been in business for 20 years iirc. Never had an issue. Other than that, I predominately use aliases that forward to my main email address.

[–] DigDoug@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago (4 children)
[–] irmadlad@lemmy.world 11 points 1 month ago

Is this for me? Do you want email? Then yes, probably.

Well, you really can't argue with that logic. LOL

[–] anticonnor@lemmy.world 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I'm liking what I'm seeing here! Most other services try to be like Google, where you can't get a mail account without also paying for drive, calendar, office, etc. All I want here is an email service, and this looks good and cheap for that.

[–] hoppolito@mander.xyz 6 points 1 month ago

It’s good but it’s also been bought out by, at least to me, an ‘unknown’ early this year. Since then, there’s been a couple outages though nothing too drastic. New owner also promised to only make changes that are ‘thoughtful and focused on making your experience better’ but I am still cautiously eyeing other options since then - I’ve learned never to trust those words by new owners.

[–] northernlights@lemmy.today 4 points 1 month ago

Seconded, been using them for years. It's just... mail. No weird stuff.

[–] airikr@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Based in USA and using AWS? Hard pass. Even Stripe is bad enough, but I do understand that one.

[–] hanrahan@slrpnk.net 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] merde@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

tuta isn't "easy to integrate" :(

[–] sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 month ago

I regret going all in on Tuta :(

[–] confuser@lemmy.zip 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Nobody mentioning fastmail, sad times.

[–] Brunette6256@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 month ago

I love fastmail! Great price for what you get!!

[–] nieminen@lemmy.world 8 points 1 month ago

Purelymail is nice. Stupid cheap and really easy.

[–] exu@feditown.com 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I use Migadu, it's probably the closest you can come to fully managing email while not hosting your own server. All their plans are limited on inbound/outbound mails per day and storage used. Beyond that you add as many domains as you want (within reason on their cheapest plan) and create any number of separate mailboxes/users.

[–] myrmidex@belgae.social 3 points 1 month ago

I second migadu. I've been with them for about a year, no problems so far, works nice with thunderbird and K9-mail.

[–] chris@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 1 month ago

Mailbox.org

[–] TechnoCat@piefed.social 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I've enjoyed ProtonMail quite a bit the last year.

[–] goatinspace@feddit.org 7 points 1 month ago (3 children)

They are becoming like gmail

[–] TechnoCat@piefed.social 3 points 1 month ago

Ah shoot. Didn't realize this was the self-hosted community. My bad.

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[–] TheButtonJustSpins@infosec.pub 6 points 1 month ago (4 children)

I can highly recommend MXroute. Just works. Great for integrations.

[–] KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Came here to say this. They even have decently priced “lifetime” accounts. Though that price raises by a reasonable amount every year or so.

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[–] epyon22@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I have plenty of server storage. Can mx route be used almost like a mail proxy? Mail stored locally and mx route used for just receiving and sending? Needs to be spouse friendly as well. Or if anyone else can recommend something else that fits that bill more.

[–] TheButtonJustSpins@infosec.pub 2 points 1 month ago

I only use it for automations (both send and receive); I'm on Proton for regular mail. They've got a few different web interfaces, so I think you can get spouse approval. Not sure on local storage (outside of POP/IMAP).

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[–] northernlights@lemmy.today 5 points 1 month ago (2 children)

I've using purelymail.com for a few years with my own domain, never had one problem, and they're cheap.

[–] victorz@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

That's the most lucrative desk I've seen I think.

[–] bmcgonag@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago

Purelynail has been awesome.

[–] Engywuck@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 month ago (3 children)
[–] fizzle@quokk.au 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

My small team using mxroute for a few years now.

Its fine. Its cheap. Support is very responsive.

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[–] sznowicki@lemmy.world 5 points 1 month ago (5 children)

Mailo.com. French company. They have quite a quirky UI. like one can tell it's made by a backend guy and the junior version is made by his younger nephew but technical wise it's perfect. All standards are there plus price is OK.

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[–] cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 1 month ago

I use inleed.xyz. It's free, has IMAP/SMTP access and you can have as many accounts as you want. It's limited to 1GB of storage shared between all accounts though.

[–] mbirth@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 month ago

I've got a so-called "Asteroid" with UberSpace. You just have to bring your own domain and configure DNS to use their servers. Unlimited mailboxes, unlimited aliases, Sieve scripts ... and SSH access.

Apart from that, I've got a free account with disroot for emergencies.

Runbox (Norway) is a good option, good privacy protection and outside of EU chat control zone

[–] d00phy@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago

Careful, I had a post like this locked almost a month ago.

FWIW, I went with purelymail, and it’s been pretty good. Basic, but solid.

[–] sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 month ago

Gmx for automatic emails to myself since the Calibre days. Maybe there is something better now.

[–] vas@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 month ago

disroot is quite decent. I like their (privacy) vibe and the set of semi-independent services they provide.

[–] fdnomad@programming.dev 2 points 1 month ago

I've been happy with Fastmail and its web & android clients so far but I havent tried to integrate it anywhere yet.

[–] The_TKS@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)
[–] sbeak@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Disroot (Netherlands) is pretty good, that's one that I have used before, and I've also heard that Fastmail (Australia) and mailbox.org (Germany) are good paid options but have never tried either.

[–] sbeak@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 month ago

Of note, PurelyMail sounds pretty good, I might have to check that one out. Looks like it's based in the U.S. though, so that could be a problem for some.

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