Cone vs Himalaya
Cone: Full-screen console mail client and newsreader from the Courier mail server project.
Himalaya: Command-line email client written in Rust that lists, reads, sends and moves mail through shell commands with JSON output.
Differences
- Cone is a full-screen terminal client; Himalaya is a command-line program.
- Only Cone has built-in POP3 and mbox.
- Only Himalaya has built-in JMAP.
- On Linux, Cone builds from source and Himalaya runs natively.
- On macOS, Cone is not available and Himalaya runs natively.
- On Windows, Cone runs through WSL and Himalaya runs natively.
- On BSD, Cone runs natively and Himalaya builds from source.
- Cone has OpenPGP; Himalaya does not.
- Himalaya has OAuth2 sign-in; Cone does not.
- Cone is written in C++; Himalaya in Rust.
- Configuration: Cone uses interactive setup screens; settings saved under ~/.cone, and Himalaya uses TOML file; interactive setup wizard.
Side by side
| Cone | Himalaya | |
|---|---|---|
| Interface | Full-screen terminal interface | Command-line tools and prompts |
| Language | C++ | Rust |
| License | GPL 3.0 | MIT or Apache 2.0 |
| Latest version | 2.5 | 2.1.0 |
| Linux | Build from source | Native |
| macOS | No | Native |
| Windows | Through WSL | Native |
| BSD | Native | Build from source |
| Android | No | No |
| IMAP | Yes | Yes |
| POP3 | Yes | No |
| SMTP | Yes | Yes |
| JMAP | No | Yes |
| Maildir | Yes | Yes |
| mbox | Yes | No |
| notmuch | No | No |
| OpenPGP | Yes | No |
| S/MIME | No | No |
| OAuth2 sign-in | No | via script |
| Threads | Yes | through the IMAP, JMAP and Gmail subcommands |
| Search | built-in folder search; server-side on IMAP | built-in query syntax across backends; server-side for IMAP and JMAP |
| HTML mail | built-in HTML renderer | No |
| Mouse | No | No |
| Multiple accounts | Yes | Yes |
| Offline use | No | with the Maildir backend and a sync tool such as mbsync |
| Calendar | No | No |
| Contacts | built-in address books, stored locally, in an IMAP folder, or on LDAP | No |
| Vim-style keys | No | No |
| Configuration | interactive setup screens; settings saved under ~/.cone | TOML file; interactive setup wizard |
Which to choose
Choose Cone for
- Handles IMAP, POP3, local mbox and Maildir folders, and newsgroups in one folder tree.
- Built-in OpenPGP signing and encryption with per-account keys.
- Optional master password encrypts saved server passwords.
Watch out for
- Not packaged by Debian, Fedora, Arch or Homebrew; usually built from source.
- No offline mode for IMAP accounts and no OAuth2.
- No S/MIME support.
Choose Himalaya for
- Every action is a shell command with optional JSON output, suited to scripts
- Native Windows binary through Scoop and GitHub releases
- Also supports JMAP, the Gmail API and Microsoft Graph
Watch out for
- No interactive interface; himalaya-tui is still pre-release
- Composing rich MIME or PGP messages needs the separate mml tool
- Version 2 dropped the notmuch and sendmail backends
Questions
What is the difference between Cone and Himalaya?
Cone is a full-screen terminal client; Himalaya is a command-line program. Only Cone has built-in POP3 and mbox. Only Himalaya has built-in JMAP.
Which runs on Windows, Cone or Himalaya?
On Windows, Cone runs through WSL. On Windows, Himalaya runs natively.
See also: Cone alternatives, Himalaya alternatives.