For many business owners, the choice between IMAP and POP3 settings for their email is a confusing and not particularly interesting decision to make.
However, getting the right settings for your business setup will make a big difference in terms of the day-to-day operation of your workforce, depending on how you use and access emails as part of the job.
What is the difference between IMAP and POP3, which works best for your business, and how exactly do you set it up?
How Does IMAP Compare to POP3?
POP3 is the simplest of the two protocols and downloads the email to your device from a mail server.
POP3 only downloads the inbox folder and will not include items from the sent list or deleted emails and will not perform any synchronisation with the email server.
IMAP lets you view the email on the server from multiple devices and synchronises all of the folders.
This means that if you create a new folder for your emails or customise the settings the changes will be seen across any device that you use to access the email client.
How To Configure POP3 and IMAP on Your Email Client
Both POP3 and IMAP are configured in the incoming service settings on the email client whatever that is ie Microsoft Outlook or Gmail, etc.
Under the heading that reads server information, there should be a field for incoming mail server. To change the setting, simply click on the dialogue box and type in imap.gmail.com
Advantages of Using POP3 Protocol
Whether or not you use IMAP or POP3 for your email will depend on the nature of your business.
POP3 is useful if you are only going to retrieve your email from one device only. One of the advantages of POP3 is that since the email is downloaded to your device this means that you can still view the downloaded emails, even if you don't have an Internet connection at the time.
So, the only time you would need the Internet connection with POP3 emails is when you are sending emails or retrieving new items in your inbox.
A further advantage of POP3 is that it frees up storage space on the mail server because once the emails have been downloaded to a device, they are deleted from the server.
Disadvantages of POP3
Since the email is only downloaded to the one device where it is viewed from, this means that if you lose the particular device, for example, if it is broken, lost, or stolen, you won't have a copy of the email unless you have an effective backup solution in place.
Using POP3 also means that your devices are more vulnerable to cyber attacks.
Because the emails are fully downloaded onto the device, there's a good chance that any virus or malware that may be contained within the email will be downloaded onto your device as well.
For this reason, when using POP3 email settings, businesses should ensure that they have a professional cyber security solution in place to mitigate the disadvantage of using this protocol.
What are the Advantages and Disadvantages of Using IMAP for Business?
The main advantage of IMAP is that you get to see all your emails including sent items, drafts, and deleted emails, plus any custom folders that you have set up or recently created with all the emails and folders synchronised.
The main disadvantage with IMAP is that without a Wi-Fi connection, you will not be able to view your emails at all as the IMAP system only caches the local copy of the email onto your device rather than actually downloading it.
Contact Lyon Tech
If you are looking for more information on technology for business, you can stay up to date with the latest developments in our news section.
For businesses looking to use either POP3 or IMAP, we provide state-of-the-art data storage and backup solutions.
For some industries, using POP3 is more suitable for their needs, despite the inherent vulnerability in terms of cybersecurity this option presents.
For those clients, and for any business looking to strengthen their security posture to the highest levels, we provide fully managed cybersecurity solutions run by a team of dedicated professionals working round the clock to secure your business from any cyber threat or potential data breach.
If you are looking for more information on effective data backup systems, cybersecurity options, or any technology to streamline and enhance your business, get in touch with our expert advisors today and we will be more than happy to answer any questions you may have.
