ForwardThis vs Shortwave
Shortwave and ForwardThis both put AI near your email, but on opposite sides of it. Shortwave is a mail client you sign into with a Gmail or Google Workspace account, and the assistant is the product: it searches years of mail in plain English, summarises threads, drafts in your voice, and runs filters that label and archive as messages land. ForwardThis has no mailbox, and no assistant to chat with. You forward one email with instructions, the work happens in your other apps, anything customer-facing is quoted back before it goes, and reversible work can be undone for 24 hours. If the inbox is where the day goes, Shortwave is the stronger tool. If it is the jobs the inbox keeps generating, forward those out.
ForwardThis and Shortwave, side by side
What it is
Sign in
Other providers
What the AI does
Automation
Pricing unit
Free plan
Paid from
Apps
Shortwave pricing and limits checked 5 September 2026.
Which one fits how you work?
Choose Shortwave if
Your mail is on Gmail or Google Workspace and the inbox is where the day goes. Shortwave is built for exactly that, and the assistant is the product rather than a feature bolted to the side.
You want to ask questions of your own email history. AI search reads across years of threads and answers in plain language, which forwarding a single email can never do.
You want mail sorted before you see it. An AI filter takes a rule written in plain English and labels, stars, archives or deletes as messages arrive.
You would rather buy capacity than features. The tiers step up the intelligence level, the daily request quota, the number of filters and the search history instead of gating separate tools.
You want automation that runs unattended. Shortwave's sister product Tasklet works around the clock across thousands of apps, and ForwardThis deliberately does not.
Choose ForwardThis if
The inbox is fine. It is the jobs each thread leaves behind that need doing somewhere else. A forwarded email becomes the request logged, the record updated, the document filed and the task set.
Your mail is not Google's. Shortwave needs a Gmail or Google Workspace account to sign in at all, and everything else routes through one. ForwardThis has no such requirement.
You want nothing acting on your accounts unless you asked. The only trigger is an email you forward, so no rule fires overnight and nothing runs while you sleep.
You want the last word on anything that speaks for you. Customer-facing wording is shown in full before it goes out, and reversible work can be undone for 24 hours.
You would rather not buy AI capacity by the seat. The free plan is 10 actions a month with every feature, and paid starts at $15 a month for 100 actions across the account.
What a single forwarded email does
The trigger is the email you forward. There is no editor and nothing to design in advance. This whole job is one email.
Ines Duarte
Renewal call follow-up, the CSV export thing
Your instructions
Post this on the Canny board under Feature requests, log it as a note on Ines's HubSpot contact, and set a task to come back to it after the renewal.
Canny
Post the request for bulk CSV export
Feature requests
Bulk CSV export. "We pull the same report every Monday and paste it into a sheet by hand. An export button would save the whole morning."
Sent after approval
HubSpot
Log the export request
Ines Duarte's timeline
Google Tasks
Set the follow-up task
My Tasks / Mon 5 Oct
You receive a confirmation email once complete, with an undo button that works for 24 hours.
Setup in 30 seconds.
What is ForwardThis?
ForwardThis is an ops assistant for your inbox. It turns email into action, without the hassle. Compatible with over 145+ of the apps you use every day.
Works with any email
Compatible with any personal or professional email provider. Gmail, Outlook and more.
145+ apps
Works across all the apps you already use every day. With more being added every month.
Setup in seconds
No complex setup, apps to install or workflows to build. Sign up, forward, done.
Secure & private
ForwardThis only acts on the emails you send it, and no data gets retained after actions have been completed.
Try it with a real email.
Forward any work email to the address below and see what ForwardThis can do. No signup required.
Occasional product emails may follow.
FAQs
- Is ForwardThis a Shortwave alternative?
- Not for the inbox. Shortwave is where you read, search and answer mail, and ForwardThis has no reading surface, so it cannot take that job on. It is an alternative for what follows a thread: the request logged on the board, the note on the CRM record, the task set in another system.
- Can both be used together?
- Yes, and the seam is clean. Shortwave handles the inbox and everything you want to know about what is in it. When a thread creates work somewhere else, forward that message on with your instructions and ForwardThis does that part. Neither one has to know the other exists.
- Does ForwardThis need a Google account?
- No. Shortwave requires a Gmail or Google Workspace account to sign in, and other providers reach it by auto-forwarding into that Gmail account first. ForwardThis has no provider requirement, because receiving forwarded email is the entire mechanism. Any address that can forward can use it.
- How does the pricing compare?
- Shortwave sells seats, and the tier mostly buys AI capacity: the published plans start at $30 a seat a month, billed monthly, stepping up the intelligence level, the daily request quota, the number of AI filters and the search history. A free plan covers most of the productivity features. ForwardThis sells actions for the whole account: 10 a month free with every feature, then $15 a month for 100, where one forwarded email is one action however many things it asks for.
- Shortwave has integrations and MCP. What is different here?
- Shortwave's assistant can reach other tools, and Tasklet goes further with unattended workflows across thousands of apps, so this is not a case of one tool having integrations and the other not. The difference is who is in charge. In ForwardThis the instruction always comes from you, on one email. Nothing in the forwarded message can change what gets done or where; it can only supply details. Anything that sends words to another person is shown to you first, and you can undo it for 24 hours.
- Does anything run on its own?
- Not in ForwardThis. Shortwave's filters act on mail the moment it arrives and Tasklet runs to a schedule, which is a real advantage when the same thing happens over and over. ForwardThis only ever acts on an email sent to it, so nothing happens unless somebody forwarded something.