# Alpine vs nmh

- Alpine: Menu-driven terminal email client descended from Pine, with built-in help, setup screens and native Windows builds.
- nmh: The MH message handling system: separate shell commands to read, file, search and send mail stored one file per message.

## Differences

- Alpine is a full-screen terminal client; nmh is a command-line program.
- Only Alpine has built-in IMAP.
- Only nmh has built-in Maildir.
- On Windows, Alpine runs natively and nmh runs through WSL.
- Alpine has mouse support; nmh does not.
- Alpine has OpenPGP; nmh does not.
- Alpine has S/MIME; nmh does not.
- Alpine has OAuth2 sign-in; nmh does not.
- Alpine has threaded views; nmh does not.
- Configuration: Alpine uses built-in setup screens, stored in .pinerc, and nmh uses ~/.mh_profile and mts.conf text files.

## Side by side

| | Alpine | nmh |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Interface | Full-screen terminal interface | Command-line tools and prompts |
| Language | C | C |
| License | Apache 2.0 | BSD 3-Clause |
| Linux | Native | Native |
| macOS | Native | Native |
| Windows | Native | Through WSL |
| BSD | Native | Native |
| Android | Through Termux | Through Termux |
| IMAP | Yes | Through a separate tool |
| POP3 | Yes | Yes |
| SMTP | Yes | Yes |
| JMAP | No | No |
| Maildir | No | Yes |
| mbox | Yes | Yes |
| notmuch | No | No |
| OpenPGP | via plugin | No |
| S/MIME | Yes | No |
| OAuth2 sign-in | Yes | No |
| Threads | Yes | No |
| Search | built-in search and message selection; server-side for IMAP | pick command matches header fields and message text |
| HTML mail | built-in HTML-to-text rendering | via mhshow with an external converter such as w3m |
| Mouse | Yes | No |
| Multiple accounts | Yes | via per-command switches or separate profiles |
| Offline use | No | full; messages are stored as local files |
| Calendar | Yes | replies to invitations with mhical |
| Contacts | built-in address book; LDAP lookup | aliases via MailAliases and the ali command |
| Vim-style keys | No | No |
| Configuration | built-in setup screens, stored in .pinerc | ~/.mh_profile and mts.conf text files |

Pages: [Alpine](https://terminalemail.com/clients/alpine/index.md), [nmh](https://terminalemail.com/clients/nmh/index.md)