What are POP Email Accounts?
POP (Post Office Protocol) is a standard protocol for
receiving e-mail. POP is a client/server protocol in which e-mail is
received and held for you by your Internet server. Periodically, you
(or your client e-mail receiver) check your mailbox on the server
and download any mail. The mail is stored on a server until you pick
it up with your favorite email program (Outlook Express, Netscape
Messenger, Eudora, etc.) POP email is built into Internet products
such as the Netscape and Microsoft Internet Explorer browsers. One
of the most popular e-mail products is Microsoft Outlook
Express.
With POP email the incoming email is stored on your virtual
server until you want to retrieve it. You would retrieve your mail
by signing into your POP email account. Most web hosts will offer a
webmaster@yourdomain POP account which can receive all
e-mail and control the settings for any optional configurable POP
accounts. If your web host offers additional POP email accounts they
can be assigned unique IDs and passwords to ensure privacy.
Often users may become confused with webmail and POP email.
The difference between the two is that with POP email, email can be
accessed through an email client program such as Microsoft Outlook
Express, Microsoft Outlook, Eudora, etc. WebMail can only be
accessed through your browser by signing into your webmail account
(like yahoo mail, hotmail, or the email account you received from
your ISP, internet service provider.)
Do I need POP email accounts?
All hosts
should provide at least one POP email account. If you want to have
email capabilities from your web hosts this is a standard feature.
Most web hosts will offer a specific amount of POP email accounts
with their hosting package. One email account is sufficient if you
will only have one individual maintaining the site. You would have
an email address, such as: webmaster@yoursite.com. However
if you would like to have two people accessing email from your
domain, such as: webmaster@yoursite.com and
support@yoursite.com you will need a web host that offers
two POP email accounts, and so on.
