Why I'm using private email and why you should too

I've been using private email providers for a few years now, switching between Proton and Tuta. I believe both are great options and they are doing an incredible job of making privacy accessible to masses. Both offer free plans but it's best to support them with your money, especially if you need more disk space or certain (paid) features. Proton seems to be more encompassing and user-friendly while Tuta is cheaper and offers simpler interface. Lately I've come back to Tuta because apparently I don't need all the bells and whistles of Proton ecosystem. I must admit, though, that I still use Proton for certain tasks other than email (mostly Drive and VPN). Proton Pass is nice as well but I happen to prefer Bitwarden for my password management.

Back to email. Why am I using Tuta and why you should at least consider switching to a more privacy-oriented email provider? The following points apply to most private email services (Proton, Tuta, etc.)

No ads. Since you pay with money and not your data, as in the case of Gmail and many other 'free' email services, you can enjoy an ad-free inbox. It's true even for free tiers.
No tracking or spying. Yup, they just have no incentive to track you or spy on you. Even more importantly, your messages won't be used to feed the beast (i.e. train AI models).
Secure storage. Your emails are fully encrypted so the provider cannot access your inbox (even if they wanted to).
End-to-end encryption for in-house messages. For example, I can exchange E2EE emails with my wife who also uses Tuta 🙂
Intuitive interface. I prefer the simplicity of Tuta but Proton is probably the best looking private email out there.
Support for custom domains. A must-have for me; this is a paid feature, which shouldn't surprise anyone.

I'm sure I forgot about something but these are the points / benefits that I first came up with. It's 2025. We have amazing tools at our disposal. You really have no excuse not to try out some of them. Why not start with a private email and get a cool new address? Or use your existing domain(s) and move seamlessly between providers. It's up to you.

Let me know what you think about these private email providers. Drop me an email and I'll make sure to include your comments in a follow-up post. You can reach me at: mnarecki@tuta.com (did anybody mention cool domains? 😉)

Reply to this on the fediverse: @michal@101010.pl