Spark Mail - AI Email & Inbox

A couple things are missing but they are hard to implement, not always due to the developer. Labels, or tags of some type for iCloud. A sticky type note that would stay within Spark for my own reference. A better cleaning of the Inbox like the “C” competitor that’s out there.

Fantastic email Serivce. Love the inbox organization and well as the ai features. Very fast and reliable.

Latest update: I actually like Spark quite a bit. I haven’t seen the slowness in the editor that I mentioned below anymore. I guess they fixed it. It’s still missing basic editor features, like adding photos at a particular point in the text or formatting. Funny enough the mobile version of the app has all these features, even though they’re obviously way more difficult to use on a tiny screen. For this I’m keeping my 3star rating. Workflow is still one of the best. The old reviews are below. ———— After more time with Spark, I discovered a few more limitations with its editor: - it can be very slow to create a reply to a long (>70 replies) thread and it gives no indication it is "thinking" - The editor is missing the feature of adding photos in a particular spot in the text. (Like Apple Mail) - The editor is missing some basic text editing stuff like fonts (i.e. you can't choose or modify your font). - You cannot compose a message in-line on a replied to email. It just adds text to the old reply and you cannot remove the indentation. As a result I had some frustrations composing some emails, and I already started thinking of finding alternatives. So far the workflow is keeping me on it and the fact that it works with 3rd party email servers. But I'm not a big fan of how you compose emails. See previous review below which contains all the other complaints, which still haven't been addressed. ---- Caveat emptor: I'm coming from Apple's Mail app after many (>10) years of being on it because it was consistent across all my devices. I also use both Gmail and Apple's iCloud Mail, the latter with 2 aliases and also with hundreds of Hide My Email emails. This is my opinion after using Spark for ~3 days only. I'll update this if there's anything major that I discover later. After trying to understand the new workflow of Spark (which took me about 1 day of messing around), I think I'm starting to get the hang of it. Here are some things that I like in no particular order (i.e. better compared to Apple's Mail): - Auto-grouping of "Notifications", "Newsletters" and "Invitations" as separate categories helps with avoiding distracting emails and allocating time to these things in batches/bulk a few times a day, as opposed to every time a new email comes in. - Better (at least IMO) use of the "Archive" functionality (it's weird it's called "Done" though) and folder of email services, which leads to a better User Experience (UX) overall. Before this app, I didn't care for Archive much as I thought it was too clunky. - Seems to work with iCloud's Hide My Email functionality well, although I still need to use it a little longer. - Has a password/FaceId locking feature, which is really useful for an extra level of protection/privacy in case the phone is stolen. It's kinda crazy to think that someone stealing your iPhone and who knows your PIN would have access to all your emails, which is how all your bank/financial accounts' passwords can be reset. This was the main reason I wanted to move away from Apple's Mail app. Some things that could be better: - I wish it had Apple Mail's Privacy Protection, Protect Mail Activity feature as I don't want people to know when I open their emails without my consent. - The AI integration seems rather simplistic and not always useful. E.g. I wanted it to write a quick reply to a colleague that I'm good with the meeting time he proposed. I wish it suggested some quick replies based on the context of the conversations, but instead it prompted me to tell the AI how I'd like to reply to the colleage. Since this is supposed to be a quick reply, it would've taken me just as long to tell the AI how to reply as me composing the reply myself. I'm sure they'll improve the functionality here in the future, but for now the AI feature as it's implemented seems more useful only when writing really long emails. - Speaking of AI, I wish it used AI to determine a bunch of things automatically and more smartly: e.g. the badge count of "unread emails" (currently this seems to be all unread emails, but I'm not interested in notifications, newsletters, etc; just actual people emails); the notifications created for new emails (similar to the badge count) should be of really useful emails, not all new emails - Categories seem hardcoded to Notifications, Invitations, Newsletters; it would be nice (but not strictly necessary) to be able to define our own categories and the AI automatically sort/filter/fill them. - The Snooze and Send later functionality and the length of time one waits seems like it could benefit from the AI integration too, so I don't have to hard code the amount of time to snooze, or what hour means "This Evening", etc. For example, the AI could try to guess what I mean by "Snooze" (without specifying "later today", or "This Evening", or "Tomorrow") and it would pop up with what it chose for me, and then I can optionally click on it to suggest something else if I disagree with its choice. It could then learn from that interaction and the email content/type how to handle a similar situation in the future. - (not sure if it does this already, but I suspect it doesn't) It should use AI to auto-determine what is important for me based on the contents of the email. If I decide something is/isn't important it should learn from my hints. The above may look like a long list of downsides, but I'm just trying to be thorough in my descriptions. The app is actually really great and it improved my email workflow already. So far I'm planning to keep using and not return to Apple Mail. I'll update this review if I find any non-negotiable later down the road. If I misrepresented something that Spark already does, my apologies. I'm still learning the app. I'll try to update this review if there's something I missed. Keep up the good work!

thats all

It is a great app, but lately it seems like they are trying too hard to sell their subscription all the time. Makes it a pain to use.

I’ve never had an issue with Spark. Even their AI integration (which I am usually not a fan of in most apps because they can be intrusive or cause performance issues) is quietly behind the scenes and done tastefully. All other features are worlds-beyond other email client apps out there, and the mobile app experience is best in the business. Highly recommend.

I've used Spark for years and recently installed this newer Spark Desktop version. So disappointing! Since they've designed the new one as a non-native app it feels clunky and glitchy, and it's missing features that come with native mac apps. Most frustrating is the lack of autocorrect. Turns out I make a lot of typos! -- I kinda need autocorrect. Readdle support suggested I use their AI proofreading instead, but I'd much prefer to use the simple autocorrect technology that's been around for decades and works seamlessly. The fact that the new app is non-native also means that some system-wide things I use daily are now different in Spark (e.g. cmd-K normally creates a hyperlink, but in Spark they changed it to shift-cmd-K). This one seems odd and very fixable: There are a bunch of buttons in the toolbar that I’ll never use, but no reply button! And there’s no way to customize the toolbar. For long emails, you have to scroll to the bottom to find the reply button. Or you can click the Actions button at the top and then select Reply. Overall it seams like the new Spark is leaning heavily into AI integration and team collaborations, things I don’t really want. They’re not prioritizing a simple and pleasant interface. There are some things they could fix to make it better, but I’m not sure it’ll ever be as good as the old version if they stick with the non-native approach.

I’ve been a premium user for some time now and I overall love this program. The most recent version, Spark Desktop, does have a few quirks yet, but it’s continually being updated, and it gets better every time. The system integration across devices works great.

Easy to use , powerful and organized

This is one of the most efficient email app I've ever used. It is visually pleasing and allows me to glance through all of my emails quickly and clear them out of my inbox even faster. I appreciate the way it organizes everything. I haven't used the AI feature much and I have not used many premium features because the app is amazing as is. I tried Superhuman I found this to be better. The only drawbacks for me are I like the calendar addition but I’d like to glance back and forth and I can’t see the calendar and the mail at the same time. And my school won't let me use my school email which is a school problem, not a Spark problem.