IMAP stands for Internet Message Access Protocol. It allows an email client (such as Thunderbird) to access messages stored on a mail server.
The Benefits of IMAP
The IMAP protocol supports both online and offline activity. Therefore, messages can be stored both on your local devices and on the server, enabling numerous benefits:
- Multiple clients can be used to access messages. For example, a Thunderbird user with a Gmail account can see the same messages with both the Thunderbird app (on desktop or Android) and Gmail.
- Thunderbird users can download their messages and attachments to their devices and then later access them even when Thunderbird is not connected to the internet.
- Messages load faster when they are stored on a local device. Likewise, search performance is much faster locally versus searching on a mail server.
- Messages stay synchronized between all devices and the email server so that every device sees the same messages. That means if you delete a message on the web or in any client, the message is deleted from both.