Popular Email Client Spark Gets Major Redesign For Mac, Moves to Subscription Model

[zilchfox]

I'll give it a shot– but I have no intentions of ever signing up for the subscription.

FWIW, the old version is still available via the Mac App Store... for now.

 

[QuarterSwede]

Ugh! you have to pay to remove the 'Sent with Spark' Email Signature now. I'll be switching to another app I guess...

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sparkmailapp.com

** Existing Spark users: all free features you had remain free for you

Hopefully this applies to the signature too. Otherwise, I will switch and I’d really hate to since I love Spark.

 

[ericeberg]

For me, the saddest part of this new release is they've rewritten the app with Electron. All the native controls are gone. I get it, maintaining a completely separate Windows version is difficult. I just lament the trend.

On the flip side: if you use Gmail, check out Mimestream. Still in beta, but a fantastic app in my use thus far (about a month).

 

[Abazigal]

Judging by the comments here this far, I would say that the marketing team at Readdle seriously misread its potential customer base.

I mean, Spark has always been a free app, so what did the devs have to lose exactly?

 

[ct2k7]

I mean, Spark has always been a free app, so what did the devs have to lose exactly?

They'll have the numbers of effective MAU/DAU whatever AU. A declining value isn't usually seen as a positive thing.

 

[john g.]

Anybody using Mimestream for their Mac? Just wondering how do you like it? I know they will be paid as well, but they seem big on privacy.

 

[ct2k7]

Anybody using Mimestream for their Mac? Just wondering how do you like it? I know they will be paid as well, but they seem big on privacy.

Looks really nice, but it's Gmail only :/, and it'll cost.

 

[QuarterSwede]

I'll take your bait: Because for ages Mail.app had serious issues interacting with both Outlook-based and Google-based email accounts, including lost emails, inability to fetch email on a timely basis, and lost credentials. Those issues are lagely fixed (although not entirely), but I long ago left Mail.app behind and see little reason to come back to it. Also, I dislike Mail.app's user interface and it lacks several organizational features (particularly on MacOS) I've come to depend on in other email clients, including pinning and prioritizing email.

Spark is one of the few clients that was (and continues to be, if you read the article) free across iOS, iPadOS, and MacOS. That it now offers a Windows client is even more gravy for someone like me that likes its workflow and appreciates a unified interface across mobile and desktop devices.

Another thing to note is that Apple has never opened its private APIs for push email, and the iOS/iPadOS clients don't support IDLE, which means if Push email (and its battery savings) are important to you, you either need to use iCloud-based accounts exclusively, or use a client that has its own push implementation, like Spark.

Finally: I use email primarily for business. I have a personal iCloud-based account, and then several Google Workspace-based accounts that are high volume. Spark allows me to receive and organize that email in a way that is intelligent to me, rather than fighting Mail.app's conventions that feel very under-developed and basic.

Whether or not I will subscribe or continue to use the free version I have no idea. Need to explore the new version better and see whether the subscription-only features are important to me or not. But this knee-jerk against subscription software is tilting at windmills. Apple itself is actively lobbying developers to adopt the model. You're going to see Apple start to gatekeep more and more of their own software and services behind paywalls as well.

That's why Spark works for me. It may not work for you. Isn't it nice we both have a choice that works for us?

I’ll add my experience:

Mail.app lost drafts of several important emails for me over the years. After that I simply don’t trust it anymore. Spark has literally never lost a single thing I wrote even in the rare event of an app crash.

I also depend on pinning to help me stay organized. And it works well with my multiple gmail accounts.

So, basically, I echo what this user said.

 

[BearsFan34]

Ugh! you have to pay to remove the 'Sent with Spark' Email Signature now. I'll be switching to another app I guess...

The "good news" is that, when replying or starting up a new email message, you can tap twice: once to select the "Sent with Spark" signature, and then another tap to remove it from the message body. Tested this, it works -- replied and sent a new email and after those two taps, the Spark signature isn't there.

This is too bad -- I like Spark a lot. Been using it for years. While I too LOATHE how seemingly everything is a subscription these days, I choose to NOT subscribe -- and will either just forget about Spark and stick with Apple's Mail on iOS/macOS like I have been, Outlook for iOS/macOS for work/on my work machines -- and just wish that in addition to the subscription model, just offer a one-time buyout option. $50? $60? I would seriously consider that -- if it meant it was a pay once & be done. Yeah, it's a lot for an email app -- but if I love something that much, I'll pay it.

Subscription fatigue. It's real. And it's an oversight to not offer options. I want to support the developers that make great apps like this one -- but give us more options than ongoing, never-ending subscriptions that you (the developer) hopes users forget about and just keep paying anyway. For those of us that are responsible with the needless amount of things that are subscriptions these days, it is disheartening to see this. Not that there's a Premium level with nice features, but that there's no option to just buy once and be done.

 

[switz]

There is NO free lunch. Some of the most expensive "free" lunches as a guest of the lawyer cost thousands of dollars.

I like the way Spark works for me with multiple email accounts on different servers. Apple's Mail has been so problem prone for me since 1990 that I wish it was a deletable app to free up space!

The Spark application is working across my two iPhones, 2 iPads, 2 Mac laptops, a Mac mini server and my Mac Studio with a consistent interface.

 

[sith33]

I'd be really happy to pay an annual fee for Spark, as it's by far my favorite mail app. But this new one is a mess. A single window Electron app which seems to have thrown out all the powerful features of the old app. Ugh, what a disappointment.

 

[BearsFan34]

I don't like subscriptions any better than anyone else. But the economics of software has changed. The iPhone App software, through competition, has driven the cost of software down to the point of being non-viable. This is due to a) the low initial price ($5?), b) Apple not allowing an in-app upgrade option, c) the expectation of long-term support. In order for any business to survive, they need cash-flow. And the subscription model provides regular revenue.
As I said, I don't like it; but I also do not bemoan them.

Agreed -- things have changed, I don't like it, and can choose to spend my money as I see fit -- however, as mentioned -- would be nice to have a buyout option. $40-$50 bucks -- even if it's just for this version -- I would pay that. Then when another redesign/new version comes out, I can choose to pay that amount or more again, or not.

 

[prophet615]

Most of the commenters didn't read the press release.
You don't need to buy a subscription for features you used to use. Such a silly thing to write a comment without proper reading.

Existing Spark users: all free features you had remain free for you

 

[johannnn]

I don’t mind subscriptions. I really don’t. I think it makes sense for developers to get a steady income, instead of getting their majority of income right after new major releases when the press highlights the app.

However, the cost must be similar to what it would have been without a subscription. $60 year per app for an email app? That’s crazy expensive for a non-pro app. I think normally there is ~3 years between major releases normally. The would mean almost $200 for one major version of one single email app!!

 

[prophet615]

Why would I ever pay for email? Lol

You don't have to pay. All features of the previous version of Spark remain free.

 

[gank41]

My biggest complaint about Apple's Mail App: After viewing and then deleting an Email in your inbox, it immediately opens the next unread email or the next read email in line. Almost all other Mail apps have the ability to NOT open another email after deleting one. Not sure why Apple doesn't see that as a Privacy issue. If I've got people in the room and we're looking at an email, but the next email is one of my bills or something even more personal, why in the heck would Apple WANT me to automatically just show everyone my own private info from some other email?!? If I wanted to view that other email that's marked unread, I'd view it.

This is the main, and now seemingly ONLY reason I don't use Apple's Mail app.

 

[OS X Dude]

Some people here are gonna get some serious whiplash - Spark has gone from beloved to a subscription app in the blink of an eye!

I tried it, and it's genuinely very good but it annoyed me that you couldn't make the most recent email appear at the top of the thread. I emailed their support to request this and, while they were very quick to reply, they said it was their "vision" and so wouldn't be implementing the change!

 

[mansplains]

I used Spark for about a year because Mail was having some issues where things wouldn't sync at all. I switched back about 6mos ago though, especially with the addition of domain support with iCloud+

all that still is not enough to sway me away from what I consider free and good enough.

This has been my venture with checking several email clients. Some have some really interesting features but Mail works well enough for most of my use cases. Next is getting rid of my gmail accounts...

 

[giebe]

Luckily Apple Mail introduced Send later with the new update. The only reason I've kept spark. So perfect timing to switch back to Apple Mail.

 

[davidjschloss]

Longtime [now former] Spark user here. If I'm going to pay monthly for an email client (I'm not) I'd get Superhuman (my work used to pay for it for me, it was quite nice, and they were good at responding). But sigh, here goes another tool off my desktop.

 

[thomasjpr]

I have no issue with paying for an email client -- I've paid for a few over the years, going all the way back to Eudora and Claris Emailer in the late 90s. I even pay for email hosting at FastMail and Microsoft, so yeah I'm invested in my email and I value quality over "free with advertising." I've used Spark in the past and really enjoyed it, but Readdle's prior model always seemed un-sustainable. All of the functions of the app were free, except for the team collaboration features. It just didn't seem like a model for sustained success and now they have had to pivot, which seems likely to give Spark a better shot at a long life. Great for them.

My beef now is likely to be the app. They have a Windows app now, so they have done what every other company has done in the past five years and moved to Electron and a unified codebase between the platforms. I'm still trying to install the new app to see how yuck it is, but it bums me out. I suspect I'll be sticking with MailMate and Mail.app.

 

[gank41]

Judging by the comments here this far, I would say that the marketing team at Readdle seriously misread its potential customer base.

That, or they expected this, and all the customers they lose are not customers they care to keep.

When companies get to be as large as Readdle is, it's not 'individual customers' that they count, it's larger percentages and metrics. Imagine a large chain restaurant that loses a customer due to an issue with their food order.. Who cares, there's probably a 20 min wait at the door for a table. And if there's too long of a wait, people go elsewhere. No biggie. There's always butts in seats. Now imagine that Mom & Pop restaurant that's always got a 45-60 min wait of people that will not go elsewhere BECAUSE their order is not only always right, but it's also always delicious. There's also always butts in these seats.

My point is that Readdle doesn't care what we think about their pricing model. They'll make their money regardless.

 

[NightFox]

I never understand how when a previously one-off payment app goes subscription for new users only, you always get a couple of original users of the app who come on here telling everyone how they've instantly deleted the app and will never use it again. Why? You already paid for it! There's no impact on the dev at all, in fact they won't even be aware so it's not even a symbolic protest gesture. It just seems like a case of cutting off your nose to spite your face.

 

[BGPL]

I dumped Spark. These companies are greedy - if we all had subscription models for every app and service, we'd be paying hundreds of dollars a month. Spark wasn't that great anyways, you had to view emails in a thread view, which I don't like and there's no setting to disable it. They force you to use something they think is great, which is super annoying. Also, Spark stores your credentials on their servers.

 

[BGPL]

Everyone complaining about subscription models. In the next breath, "I'm so sick of all these ads..."

Apparently you haven't been alive long enough to know there was once a time when we bought an application and we owned it until the next major upgrade, but could choose to keep the deprecated version at no cost.