Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird or A. N. Other?

Outlook Express is the market leading email client, used throughout the world today. After all, it comes pre-installed with Windows, it is functional and quick to grasp. As such, some love it, others (feeling forced down the ‘Microsoft path’) hate it… and the vast majority just don’t really care, after all ‘it does the job for me, it's only email!’

In her article Outlook Express and Mozilla Thunderbird Slugfest: Choosing the right Email Client, Victoria Kapauan-Gaerlan discusses the merits of Outlook Express against its most worthy competitor, Mozilla Thunderbird. Its a good argument and one many people are oblivious to, for as was the case with the Web Browser Wars, there is an email slugfest in progress and it would be wise to make the smart decision. So which side of the ring are you cheering for?

I'm in the "don't really care" camp. I see no good reason why an OE (or Windows Mail or Outlook) user should switch to Thunderbird - or vice versa, for that matter. While they all have certain strengths and weaknesses, there's really no substantial difference between them in my opinion. I'll continue to use the product with which I happen to be most familar: Outlook.

I agree. For multiple mailbox users across several service providers I think Outlook Express works great. I did previously like MS Outlook until I found that I couldn't use Hotmail inside the product. I assume thats been fixed now but it was a mjor pain at the time. For me a nice mix of webmail (SmarterMail) and Outlook Express is all I need.

To use Outlook with Hotmail you need to install the Outlook Connector.