What Is Outlook Express (OE)?

Once upon a moment, there was a magical little email client called Outlook Express. It was the best email client ever because it was free and came with Internet Explorer, which was also free. It had all the components you could want in an email client: saving messages, sending messages, receiving messages, and managing messages (if you're unsure what any of those mean, don't worry—we'll tell you more about them later) but then… tragedy struck! Microsoft stopped including Outlook Express with Windows 98 and up. We were devastated! How would we send emails without Outlook Express? How would we manage our email without Outlook Express (OE)? How would we even know who had sent us an email but then there was hope! Microsoft replaced Outlook Express with Windows Mail and Windows Live Mail, which we're pretty sure are both okay things to use now (but still not as good as OE). Outlook Express and Outlook are both email clients, but they're different. They do similar things and have similar names—but if you want to get technical about it, they're not even related. Microsoft Outlook is used to send and receive emails; Outlook Express was a part of Internet Explorer in older versions of Windows. Outlook Express is not comparable to Microsoft Outlook; both operate by sending and receiving emails. Still, their codebase is entirely different from each other, and they are, indeed, separate programs. Their similar names often confused them being the same. You know you're always wondering, "What happened to Outlook Express?" Outlook Express was the email client with Windows XP and was discontinued after Windows Vista. It was replaced by Windows Mail and integrated into Windows Messenger, which is why you probably don't even remember it anymore. But here's the thing: when we launched our new [product name] product, we realized that there are still people out there who miss Outlook Express! So, we decided to bring it back—in all its classic glory—to fill those holes in your heart.