There’s so much task management and so much calendar, but my weak spot has traditionally been email. I never found the formula to tame it, and I resigned myself to the acceptance of that fact. inbox zeroLike winning the lottery, it was for other people.

Until I decided to try Spark sometime in 2022After years of seeing it floating around app stores and arrogantly assuming it wasn’t for me, that there was no need for anything else with the native email app.

I was less cautious about refusing to try Spark than I was when Decca rejected the Beatles.

less boring

Spark is an application developed by Readdle, a Ukrainian studio whose catalog also includes other applications such as Documents, Calendars or Scanner Pro (Scanner Pro). naming That’s not where these people shine.) It had already convinced me when I started using it at the beginning of 2022, but the big update that came that summer dazzled me.

What has changed the way I manage email is that Spark is designed entirely to be used via keyboard shortcuts. If I see an email and want to reply to it, I just press R, if I want to archive it, I just press E. And with any similar operation.

But what makes Spark different is that guides you through handling emails as if they were tasks, inviting you to complete them all until you leave the inbox clean. If an email has been read and requires nothing else, we complete (archive) it. If we think it would be better to delete it, we delete it. If we respond but it’s part of an ongoing task, or we haven’t responded yet but it’s something we need to do, we keep it visible in the inbox.

Clear tray and emails as a task. Image: Xataka.

Nothing has been possible so far… but Spark makes it much easier with this approach: it sends emails as tasks, inviting you to always look for the empty tray.

Another way to leave the tray empty is another good Spark function: Possibility to ‘remove’ emails. Ideal for emails we want to deal with later without rushingProcessing when we can (such as reading a long text) newsletter or reply to a non-urgent email). This takes them to another part of the interface; a floating bubble above the inbox that tells us how many we’ve reserved to keep it from getting out of control.

For emails that need to be processed within a certain period of time, there is a ‘Snooze’ function, like an alarm clock. When we say this, we remove it from our sight and send it back to our inbox.

Another interesting feature of Spark about never missing an email moment: add reminders about sent emails. It’s a classic: We email someone, they don’t respond, and we quickly forget about it, until after a while we realize there’s no response. Sometimes when it’s too late. With this function we can set a reminder to warn us that we did not receive a response.

Similarly, we can also schedule sending of emails with an interesting interface of predefined optionsSet emails or senders directly as priority to understand the special importance of a new message at a glance.

And one of the amazing options: permanent filtering of new senders. If someone sends us an email and Spark detects that this is the first time we have received an email from that address, the app will ask us if we want to accept this new sender with a two thumbs up or thumbs down button. . If we accept, your emails will reach us normally.

Otherwise, your emails will forever be buried in the ‘Blocked’ folder, unlike the ‘Spam’ folder. We can also permanently silence email chains that are no longer useful to us.

Accept or block a new sender. Image: Xataka.

Another of its recently added functions is the integration of the GPT API. what the app calls ‘Spark AI’: When we decide to use it, it reads the message or message chain and takes advantage of our simple instruction (there are even buttons with default options such as ‘I’m interested’, ‘Not interested’ or ‘Thank you’) that we specify, extended by GPT and taking into account the context of the received email Creates a reply email containing the message.

In the Spark settings we can set various options around the default length or tone for our responses. I don’t think it’s appropriate to resort to this type of response frequently, but it can be useful in situations like email. have to respond, but this was not written to us personally, for example.

And a detail about using this application with corporate email accounts: It supports the use of HTML signatures. Not all email management apps do this.

HTML signature in the email. Image: Xataka.

Spark is highly recommended to anyone who finds email management a necessary evil; This is something they need to do as they receive a lot of emails on a daily basis. It’s hardly worth it for someone whose work doesn’t go through email and barely makes it to personal use. You can try the free version, but maybe you can get by with the web or regular native app.

For those who have made email an important part of their routine, Spark helps make this a much less tedious task. All of these additions combined to completely change the way I use email. and the desire to face it throughout the day.

Spark is available for Windows, macOS, iOS and Android; Besides IMAP, Google mail, iCloud, Outlook etc. It is also compatible with; and can be used for free with limited functions, or by paying a subscription to access the full application: 8.99 euros per month or 69.99 euros per year. This will rightfully deter many people, but others may understand it as I do: It’s a matter of saving time and peace of mind.

Featured image | Xataka.

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