Most people don’t need to spend money on email. Many companies offer free email services, but some are better than others. I’ll help you choose the best ones and tell you what makes them special.

I created an account on each of these sites to try out the features, and I still use some of them regularly.

It probably comes as no surprise that Gmail tops this list. I’ve been using Google’s free email service for years. It has a modern look, is tightly integrated with the company’s other services, and does a good job of blocking spam.

It also has a few other handy features, such as the ability to snooze emails for later, schedule emails to be sent in the future, and read emails offline. You can also send emails that expire and require a unique code to open, store messages in a 15GB vault, share files from your cloud storage account, undo sending messages, and set vacation responses. Google’s Gemini service is even built right in (if you sign up).