Unibox, a new Messages-style email client that was first announced in August of 2012, is now available for download as part of a public beta test.

The app is designed to make email more "personal" by organizing emails into a contact-centric view. Unibox's interface is divided into two main panes, with the left side displaying contacts and the right side displaying all messages that have been received/exchanged with a particular person or website.

uniboxemail1
According to Unibox, this chat-like design significantly reduces email clutter by grouping incoming messages from contacts into a single list.

Composing emails with the app is done in a single window, which eliminates separate compose windows utilized by existing apps like Mail. All attachments sent to and received from contacts are readily available, and attached media is presented in a grid view.

unibox2
Unibox supports all IMAP accounts and works with both Mountain Lion and Mavericks. The full Mac app is expected to be released at the end of September, and ahead of release, users can sign up for the beta on the company's website. Beta will last until the Mac app debuts.

Top Rated Comments

pgiguere1 Avatar
160 months ago
Seems like a weird timing considering personnal email addresses are getting less and less used for human-to-human communication, and more and more for advertising or various automatic notifications from websites.

Of course I can't speak for everyone but it seems to me that social networks and text messages are where most human-to-human communication is done nowadays. This could have been a good concept 10 years ago.
Score: 4 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Michael Goff Avatar
160 months ago
installed and used it for 1 minute. uninstalled and got back to airmail. email shouldn't be listed by contact, but by subject. sparrow died so airmail is the new king.

Am I the only one who just uses the mail.app?

What makes airmail so much better?
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
seamer Avatar
160 months ago
It doesn't support Exchange
Google's IMAP is detected properly

I have two accounts configured in mine, and there's no way to quickly see which mailbox I'm looking at. There's a lack of folders... And I can't drag mail from one box to another
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
vanc Avatar
160 months ago
Does it support mail threads? Without that, we cannot really use in a business environment as emails may have multiple people involved.

Anyway, mail.app is the only email client I'm using on Mac. It works fine for me since 2007 when I started using Mac. Just the vanilla app. No plugins.
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)
curmudgeon32 Avatar
160 months ago
Seems like a weird timing considering personnal email addresses are getting less and less used for human-to-human communication, and more and more for advertising or various automatic notifications from websites.

Of course I can't speak for everyone but it seems to me that social networks and text messages are where most human-to-human communication is done nowadays. This could have been a good concept 10 years ago.

Sometimes email is the right medium, sometimes not. I have conversations with people across various media (email, texts, Facebook messages, the occasional Twitter DM).

What I'd like is a single app or system or something that can work across multiple streams so that you click on a contact and see everything from that person, regardless of how it was sent.
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)
teejaysplace Avatar
160 months ago
Looks great for those with at most ~10-20 contacts.

It groups things by day first, then by contact. So you'll see all the emails that you received from John The Boss today, then the ones you received from him yesterday, etc. I suppose if you receive 500 emails from 200 different people each day, then this isn't the organizational system for you. But for those who work on small teams, I can definitely see the upside.

When I'm working on a project, I find I'm paying closest attention to the people directly involved, while others remain in the periphery. So I enjoy knowing right off the bat that I've received 5 emails from my boss and 3 emails from the Assistant Director. It's a lot easier than trying to read back over endless threads of text.

But I also need to file emails accordingly, beyond just the sender. Like if something is a receipt, it needs to go under purchasing, regardless of the sender. After using the program this morning, I didn't see an obvious way to do that. I also found I have to right click each time I want to delete a message (pressing the Delete key won't do it.) And if it's one thing busy office workers hate, it's extra clicks.

Overall, the idea has significant upside, but the execution isn't 100% there yet.
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

iOS 26

iOS 26.4 and iOS 27 Features Revealed in New Leak

Friday December 12, 2025 10:56 am PST by
Macworld's Filipe Espósito today revealed a handful of features that Apple is allegedly planning for iOS 26.4, iOS 27, and even iOS 28. The report said the features are referenced within the code for a leaked internal build of iOS 26 that is not meant to be seen by the public. However, it appears that Espósito and/or his sources managed to gain access to it, providing us with a sneak peek...
iOS 26

Apple Releases iOS 26.2 With Alarms for Reminders, Lock Screen Changes, Enhanced Safety Alerts and More

Friday December 12, 2025 10:10 am PST by
Apple today released iOS 26.2, the second major update to the iOS 26 operating system that came out in September, iOS 26.2 comes a little over a month after iOS 26.1 launched. ‌iOS 26‌.2 is compatible with the ‌iPhone‌ 11 series and later, as well as the second-generation ‌iPhone‌ SE. The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPhones over-the-air by going to Settings >...
Apple Foldable Thumb

Leak Reveals Foldable iPhone Details

Monday December 15, 2025 9:09 am PST by
The first foldable iPhone will feature a series of design and hardware firsts for Apple, according to details shared by the Weibo leaker known as Digital Chat Station. According to a new post, via machine translation, Apple is developing what the leaker describes as a "wide foldable" device, a term used to refer to a horizontally oriented, book-style foldable with a large internal display....
iOS 26

iOS 26.2 Coming Soon With These 8 New Features on Your iPhone

Thursday December 11, 2025 8:49 am PST by
Apple seeded the second iOS 26.2 Release Candidate to developers earlier this week, meaning the update will be released to the general public very soon. Apple confirmed iOS 26.2 would be released in December, but it did not provide a specific date. We expect the update to be released by early next week. iOS 26.2 includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, such as a new...
macOS Tahoe 26 Thumb

Apple Releases macOS Tahoe 26.2 With Edge Light

Friday December 12, 2025 10:08 am PST by
Apple today released macOS Tahoe 26.2, the second major update to the macOS Tahoe operating system that came out in September. macOS Tahoe 26.2 comes five weeks after Apple released macOS Tahoe 26.1. Mac users can download the macOS Tahoe update by using the Software Update section of System Settings. macOS Tahoe 26.2 includes Edge Light, a feature that illuminates your face with soft...
AirPods Pro Firmware Feature

Apple Releases New Firmware for AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3

Thursday December 11, 2025 11:28 am PST by
Apple today released new firmware designed for the AirPods Pro 3 and the prior-generation AirPods Pro 2. The AirPods Pro 3 firmware is 8B30, up from 8B25, while the AirPods Pro 2 firmware is 8B28, up from 8B21. There's no word on what's include in the updated firmware, but the AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3 are getting expanded support for Live Translation in the European Union in iOS...
ipados 26 1 slide over

Apple Releases iPadOS 26.2 With Multitasking Improvements

Friday December 12, 2025 10:09 am PST by
Apple today released iPadOS 26.2, the second major update to the iPadOS 26 operating system released in September. iPadOS 26.2 comes a month after iPadOS 26.1. The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPads over-the-air by going to Settings > General > Software Update. iPadOS 26.2 continues with the multitasking improvements that were added with iPadOS 26.1. You can now drag and...
airpods max 2024 colors

AirPods Max 2 Likely to Offer These 10 New Features

Monday December 15, 2025 7:41 am PST by
Apple released the AirPods Max on December 15, 2020, meaning the over-ear headphones launched five years ago today. While the AirPods Max were updated with a USB-C port and new color options last year, followed by support for lossless audio and ultra-low latency audio this year, the headphones lack some of the features that have been introduced for newer generations of the regular AirPods and the ...