Easy! IT | Protocol | Internet Message Access Protocol

This article is a rough explanation of the Internet Message Access Protocol.

Everything might be not exactly correct in this article but it’s very useful for beginners to understand IT terms. If you want to learn IT but you don’t have any experience to work in the IT industry, I wish it helps you to understand IT. And I hope that this article motivates you to study IT more.

Let’s start our 3 minutes lesson!

What is the Internet Message Access Protocol?

The Internet Message Access Protocol is known as IMAP.
IMAP4 is in common use.
IMAP4 allows you to view emails on any devices from anywhere.

1. Email service

You can send messages with a digital letter called an email. Users can send an email with a client (mail application such as Gmail, yahoo mail, outlook and so on), and mail servers receive and deliver them.

In short, an email is a letter in a computing world, and the mail server is a post office in that world.

**A user sends messages with an email client, and a mail server is a post office.**

2. Internet Message Access Protcol

Internet Message Access Protocol(IMAP) is a protocol to allow mobile and desktop email applications to access email on an email server.

What is the SMTP?: Easy! IT | Protocol | Simple Mail Transfer Protocol | Japan Teams

IMAP was developed as an alternative to POP(Post Office Protocol). Both IMAP and POP are used to access emails on an email server. However, there are some key differences between the two of them. If you don’t know POP, please check the following article:

What is the POP?: Easy! IT | Protocol | Post Office Protocol | Japan Teams

3. IMAP vs POP

Using POP, you can only view emails in the specific email client on the specific computer that you downloaded them to. Because a mail server marks messages for deletion and deletes them after you download.

**Using POP, you need to download emails, and a mail server delete emails after you download them.**

In contrast to POP, IMAP allows you to log into any internet-connected email client, or a webmail site, and view all of the same emails at any time. In a constantly connected world, the ability to send and receive emails from both email clients and webmail sites. This has made IMAP very popular.

**IMAP allows you to view emails both online and offline.**

With IMAP, your email is stored on your providers’ email servers until you delete them. While this makes email access convenient, some providers limit the amount of email you can store on their mail servers. And they temporary suspend email services if you exceed that amount.

The advantages of IMAP

A mail server and an email client synchronize with each other, which allows you to use several devices to view emails.
While a mail server using POP deletes emails after you download, a mail server for IMAP keeps emails. So you can view emails from anywhere without downloading them if you can access and connect to a mail server.
Even if your device has a trobule or you buy a new device, they will not affect to view emails. You can view them with new devices connecting to a mail server.

The disadvantages of IMAP

While IMAP remedies many of the shortcomings of POP, this introduces additional complexity. And also you need to consider additional security measures. So the server management is much more difficult compared with POP mail servers, but there are not many problems for email users.