Compare
Private email, honestly compared.
Five providers, the differences that actually decide it, and the cases where Mailotte is the wrong answer. Every rival claim links to their own page.
Most "best private email" lists rank providers as if they were competing at the same thing. They are not. There is a real fork in this category, and once you see it the choice gets much easier:
- Providers that cannot read your mail — Proton Mail, Tuta. The server holds ciphertext. The guarantee is cryptographic, and the cost is paid in search, sorting and client support, every day, forever.
- Providers that can read your mail but do not monetise it — Mailotte, Fastmail. The guarantee is legal and commercial rather than mathematical. In exchange the inbox actually works: real search, real clients, and in Mailotte's case, software that sorts the mail for you.
Gmail sits outside both: it can read your mail and its business model is advertising. That is the thing most people are actually leaving.
Neither side of the fork is "more private" in the abstract. The right question is who are you defending against? If the answer includes your own provider, take the cryptographic guarantee and accept the trade. If the answer is the advertising industry, take the working inbox.
The differences that decide it
| Mailotte | Gmail | Proton Mail | Tuta | Fastmail | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Can the provider read your mail? | Yes — but never profiles, sells or trains on it | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Ads in the inbox | No | Yes, from your Google activity | No | No | No |
| Mail stored in the EU | Always | No guarantee | Switzerland / EU | Germany | Optional (EU or USA) |
| Operating company's jurisdiction | UK | USA | Switzerland | Germany | Australia |
| Works with Apple Mail / Thunderbird | Yes, directly | Yes | Paid desktop bridge only | No — no IMAP at all | Yes |
| Inbox sorts itself / AI assistance | Yes | Yes | Writing assistant only | No | No |
| Your mail used to train AI | Never | Not without permission | No | No | No |
Where Mailotte is the wrong choice
If you need your provider to be technically incapable of reading your mail, Mailotte does not qualify and no policy makes up for it — read the Proton and Tuta comparisons instead. If you want twenty years of operating history and the deepest standards support available, Fastmail is the safer buy. We would rather you land somewhere that fits than churn out in a month.
Read the full comparisons
- Mailotte vs Gmail — Most Gmail alternatives ask you to give up the smart features to get the privacy.
- Mailotte vs Proton Mail — These two solve different problems.
- Mailotte vs Tuta — Tuta encrypts more of your mailbox than almost anyone.
- Mailotte vs Fastmail — Fastmail is the closest comparison of the four — ad-free, standards-first, and now offering EU data residency.