# Forward Email vs mblaze

- Forward Email: Forward Email's webmail in the terminal: mail, calendar, contacts and settings, with mouse support and a key hint bar.
- mblaze: Set of small Unix utilities for reading, searching, threading and composing mail stored in Maildir folders.

## Differences

- Forward Email is a full-screen terminal client; mblaze is a command-line program.
- Forward Email connects to Forward Email accounts through its API; mblaze works with any provider, including Forward Email.
- On Windows, Forward Email runs natively and mblaze runs through WSL.
- On Android, Forward Email runs through Termux and mblaze is not available.
- Forward Email has mouse support; mblaze does not.
- Forward Email has calendar support; mblaze does not.
- Forward Email is written in TypeScript; mblaze in C.
- Configuration: Forward Email uses settings screens, keyboard shortcut editor and an optional user.css, and mblaze uses ~/.mblaze/profile (header-style key: value lines).
- Forward Email is source-available (Business Source License 1.1); mblaze is open source (CC0 1.0 and MIT).

## Side by side

| | Forward Email | mblaze |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Interface | Full-screen terminal interface | Command-line tools and prompts |
| Language | TypeScript | C |
| License | Business Source License 1.1 | CC0 1.0 and MIT |
| Linux | Native | Native |
| macOS | Native | Native |
| Windows | Native | Through WSL |
| BSD | Native | Native |
| Android | Through Termux | Not supported |
| IMAP | Forward Email API | Through a separate tool |
| POP3 | Forward Email API | Through a separate tool |
| SMTP | Forward Email API | Through a separate tool |
| JMAP | Forward Email API | No |
| Maildir | Forward Email API | Yes |
| mbox | Forward Email API | No |
| notmuch | Forward Email API | No |
| OpenPGP | Yes | via contrib scripts |
| S/MIME | No | No |
| OAuth2 sign-in | No | No |
| Threads | Yes | Yes |
| Search | built-in, across messages, contacts and events | mpick and magrep filter messages by headers, flags and content |
| HTML mail | shown as formatted text with links; plain text by default | via a filter command in ~/.mblaze/filter used by mshow |
| Mouse | Yes | No |
| Multiple accounts | Yes | via separate Maildirs and profile settings |
| Offline use | drafts and changes made offline are sent when the connection returns | full; works only on local Maildir |
| Calendar | Yes | No |
| Contacts | Yes | No |
| Vim-style keys | No | No |
| Configuration | settings screens, keyboard shortcut editor and an optional user.css | ~/.mblaze/profile (header-style key: value lines) |

Pages: [Forward Email](https://terminalemail.com/clients/forward-email/index.md), [mblaze](https://terminalemail.com/clients/mblaze/index.md)