What are POP3, IMAP, and SMTP?

☝️ POP, POP3, IMAP, and SMTP are all acronyms used in configuring email. We'll look at what they mean and how they relate.
☝️ POP3, IMAP, SMTP
POP3: Post Office Protocol version 3, used to download email.
IMAP: Internet Message Access Protocol, used to access email via multiple devices.
SMTP: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, used to send mail from one computer or server to the next.
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✅ Watch next ▶ Be Careful Deleting Email If You Use IMAP ▶ • Be Careful Deleting Em...
Chapters
0:00 POP3, IMAP, and SMTP
0:50 POP: Post Office Protocol
2:00 IMAP: Internet Message Access Protocol
3:50 SMTP: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol
5:00 Webmail works differently, mostly
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#askleo #POP3 #IMAP

[@sennthemanwin98]

Leo, at this point you deserve a wikipedia. Thanks for helping us out and being our guide around the internet!

[@askleonotenboom]

I remain wikipedia-entryless. I'm what I refer to as a "Z-list" internet celebrity, and even then the word "celebrity" is a stretch. :-)

[@sennthemanwin98]

​@@askleonotenboomhaha, keep it up man.

[@kylemlsantos97]

Exceptionally clear explanations. Thank you greatly, Leo!

[@user-ji7xx4nk2b]

Great explanation, thank you. I used the gmail for most of the time and didn't know these protocol purpose. And I'm a programmer. What a shame. Well, now i know.

[@bentleymitchell5979]

Thank you for posting 🙂

[@aldrinjohnencina6153]

thank you so much. very clear explanations.

[@keithswalley5340]

I have used MS Outlook for likely 15+ years. I still use a Pop3 setup. Back when I used an iPhone (3.5+ years ago), I could access my e-mail on the iPhone when traveling, delete most of the mails, and still be able to access those (phone) deleted mails when I returned to my PC at home. When I switched to an Android phone, I discovered that it needed an imap account for it to work on the phone. Due to research that I do, I want to preserve certain (now a couple of thousand) e-mails on my PC. So, I do not use e-mail on my phone as deleting it on my phone would delete it everywhere....so I'm told. I want everything on my PC, where I regularly back up, and will cull it from there. So, I stay with pop3. 'Course, now that I'm old, I can wait until I return home to read my e-mails, but phone access would be convenient. Now, the additional issue is how to save all of those .pst e-mails on my PC to a readable format if and when I leave MS Outlook.

[@brightonmusic]

Thank you! As always, fantastic useful information

[@inexpensivegames]

Leo thank you for the Ip address video saved me a heart attack!

[@Jack-fs2im]

thanx sooooo hope you do a WSAP modem settings explain.thanx again

[@shadowminister4090]

Thankyou Leo for your great videos. My son is an IT person; me, not so much. Some years ago, he set up Thunderbird for me and it sounds like he used IMAP, because when I deleted emails on my PC, I still had copies on my other devices. I don't use Thunderbird now that I have Gmail, but at the time, I found it annoying because I needed to delete the messages twice. In hindsight, I can see not losing your original, has a lot of advantages.

[@wilberteverhart5723]

I am also interested in this response. In addition, some of my outlook accounts resend messages to the extent I wake up to 300-400 new messages each day.

[@shadowminister4090]

@wilberteverhart5723 Oh my goodness! Help Leo! 😃

[@tioluwani6928]

Thanks Leo

[@NoEgg4u]

I used to use Outlook 2007, configured with POP3. That version of Outlook had an option to leave the e-mail on the server (download, but do not delete). I do not know what current versions of Outlook have, or what other e-mail clients have. But if I had to guess, I would say that they, too, can be configured the same way (to not delete your messages from the e-mail server). I once heard that POP3 does its business in the clear, whereas IMAP creates an encrypted tunnel between you and the e-mail server -- making it a more secure choice for exchanging e-mail messages between you and the e-mail server. I might be mistaken, and not interested enough to search for the answer. Maybe someone else can elaborate.

[@askleonotenboom]

Most POP3 clients support the "leave messages on server" option. Both POP3 and IMAP (and SMTP) can be configured to use (or not) an encrypted connection. It's all part of how you configure the client. Look for things like "SSL" and "TLS" options. Those are encrypted.

[@matthewkeen6281]

nice.

[@AzminGamespot]

Hey can you help me, I remember my email and password but the problem is it's asking if it's really me trying to sign in, i dont have my phone with me so i hate how even though it's right password but still asking if it me

[@askleonotenboom]

You haven't told me what account this is for. In general you can either wait until you get your phone, or do some kind of password recovery (forgot password).

[@AzminGamespot]

@@askleonotenboom umm actually my brother comment this l- oh he got his phone back

[@AzminGamespot]

​@@askleonotenboomteacher took his phone lol actually

[@jamesweber4938]

I cannot send a gmail email to myself using Thunderbird. Do I have a setting wrong in Thunderbird ?

[@askleonotenboom]

It should work. There are times when Gmail will interfere, though. I would test sending between two different accounts. (And give it time... there are spam fighting techniques that can introduce delays.)

[@jamesweber4938]

@@askleonotenboom Hello Leo, Thank you for your response. I thought I had the problem solved when I removed a message filter in Thunderbird. I sent an email to myself and an email arrived but then I noticed it was a sent notification of the email I had sent and it was in my inbox and no notification was in my sent box !

[@franciscohorna5542]

which one dose web based email use outlook and gmail

[@askleonotenboom]

Web-based email uses none of them. They have a direct connection to the email and don't need to transmit it via any protocol.

[@franciscohorna5542]

@@askleonotenboom ok thanks for info