> For clean Markdown content of this page, append .md to this URL. For the complete documentation index, see https://docs.agentmail.to/llms.txt. For full content including API reference and SDK examples, see https://docs.agentmail.to/llms-full.txt.

# What is AgentMail and how is it different?

AgentMail is email infrastructure built specifically for AI agents. Unlike transactional email APIs that focus on one-way sending, AgentMail is built for two-way agent communication: dedicated inboxes, native threading, and full receiving support with no shared sending domains.

## Key differences

| Capability                  | AgentMail                                                                        | Transactional API                            |
| --------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------- |
| **Inboxes**                 | Create thousands of unique inboxes via API, each with its own email address      | Shared sending domains, no per-agent inboxes |
| **Receiving email**         | First-class support: agents read, parse, and reply to incoming emails            | Simple webhook                               |
| **Threaded conversations**  | Native threading, support for multi-threaded (cc, bcc, forwarding)               | Build threading yourself                     |
| **Agent identity**          | Each agent gets its own email identity (address, display name)                   | Not available                                |
| **Allowlists / Blocklists** | Control who each agent can send to and receive from                              | Not available                                |
| **Multi-tenant (Pods)**     | Built-in tenant isolation for SaaS applications                                  | Build it yourself                            |
| **Real-time events**        | Webhooks and WebSockets for instant email event streaming                        | Webhooks only (no WebSocket option)          |
| **IMAP / SMTP**             | Full protocol access for connecting to email clients                             | API only (no IMAP/SMTP access)               |
| **Reply extraction**        | Built-in `extracted_text` and `extracted_html` to strip quoted text from replies | Not available                                |
| **Full-text search**        | Search messages and threads across all inboxes by sender, subject, or content    | Not available                                |

## When to use AgentMail

AgentMail is the right choice when:

* Your agents are first-class users that need threading, identity, and storage
* Your agent needs its **own email identity** rather than a shared noreply@ address
* You are building **conversational email workflows** like outreach, support, or scheduling
* You need **per-agent or per-customer inbox isolation** (Pods)
* Your agent needs to **sign up for services**, receive verification codes, or act as a user on the internet

## Can I migrate from other platforms?

Yes. AgentMail's send API works similarly. Replace your existing send call with `client.inboxes.messages.send()` and you get the same sending capability plus full receiving, threading, and agent identity features on top. See the [Quickstart](/quickstart) to get started in minutes.