To get started, let’s look at each protocol and their function.
EAS is the industry standard for syncing SmarterMail to mobile devices, such as iPhones, iPads and Android devices. It offers “Exchange-like” functionality for iOS and Android, such as calendar syncing, the synchronization of notes and tasks, etc. on top of the ability to send and receive email. EAS also works with the Mail, People and Calendar apps on Windows 10.
MAPI is primarily used with Outlook 2016 and above on Windows desktops. It's offers native integration between Outlook and SmarterMail, giving users a true Exchange experience. This includes things like sharing email folders, calendars, contacts, tasks and notes as well as additional Outlook and Exchange features like sharing of secondary calendars and contact folders, creating personal distribution lists, and much more.
EWS is very similar to MAPI and was developed essentially as the MAPI-equivalent to be used with Mac Mail or Microsoft Outlook for Mac. In addition, it’s the protocol used by
eM Client, a popular email client that’s available for both MacOS and Windows.
All three protocols are licensed from Microsoft: MAPI & EWS are both server-wide licenses whereas EAS is licensed per instance/mailbox. Because MAPI & EWS are so closely related, they share some features and functionality to provide the overall Exchange experience. As such, we are required to package them together as one add-on.
SmarterTools works very closely with Microsoft and we have negotiated significantly discounted rates for each of these protocols. That means that, in almost all cases, SmarterMail is significantly cheaper than our competitors when comparing our licensing, and we offer a solution that FAR exceeds what our competitors offer when it comes to Outlook integration. That’s because most of our competitors offer Outlook plugins to simulate MAPI. These plug-ins are based on IMAP functionality coupled with WebDAV. They offer limited functionality when compared to MAPI and EWS, and require a separate plugin installed in Outlook and are often very unstable and cause Outlook to crash. Take a look to
see how SmarterMail stacks up to our competitors.
As you can imagine, Microsoft is very strict, and extremely particular, about the licensing of, and payment for, their intellectual property. Our ability to exceed their exacting standards is just one of the reasons why we have such a good relationship with them.