Have you ever wondered how your mail often reaches the receiver’s mailbox? Interestingly, it may seem like a matter of a few seconds, but it has a long and complex process. Once you know how an email server works, you will have a more precise idea about the purpose of the email server.

It does matter what type of email client you choose to send and receive messenger, the core concept of email server will remain the same. However, without an email server, you won’t be able to send and receive emails. 

What Is an Email Server? 

An email server is regarded as a digital mailbox, and with the help of this, you can send and receive messages. However, when you click the ‘send’ button after composing an email, it doesn’t go with the receiver mailbox directly. Instead, some steps and processes take place before the delivery of your email to the final destination. 

So, one thing is pretty much sure here, and that is, it’s not all about sending mail to one device from another. There’s more to discuss. Though you don’t need to know how the email server works or the purpose of the email server, having a precise idea will help you a lot in running your own mail server. 

What Are the Types of Email Servers?

The main job of an email server is to function mails properly and send them to the desired destination. Every mail has two points. One point is the receiver and the second or last point is the sender. Accordingly, there are two types of email servers out there. 

The first one is the outgoing email server, or Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), and the other server is the incoming email server or Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP and Post Office Protocol (POP). However, the functioning of the mail won’t be possible if there is even a server missing.  

How Does Email Server Work? 

If you read carefully, you will be able to know how the email server works more efficiently. First, when someone composes and mail, including the receiver’s email address and clicks ‘send’, the mail goes to the protocol named Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) as mentioned above. 

However, the SMTP server is usually connected to the sender’s domain, so when it takes any mail, it can identify the sender of the mail. Once the SMTP receives a mail from a sender, it then looks for the receiver domain to send the email. 

If the sender sends emails to people within a company using the same server, the SMTP can directly send the email to the receiver. But, if this doesn’t happen, the SMTP has to look up in the DNS server to find out the IP address of the recipient. Once the SMTP finds the IP address, it can direct the email to the POP3 server. Then, the email is processed in a queue before being accessible to the recipient. This is how the email server works; you may have an idea of the purpose of the email server.