ForwardThis vs Spark Mail
Spark Mail is an email app and ForwardThis is not one, so this was never really a swap. Spark, from Readdle, is where you read mail on a Mac, a phone, an iPad or a Windows machine, with a Smart Inbox that sorts the noise, a Gatekeeper that screens senders you do not know, and an assistant that summarises threads and takes meeting notes. It costs nothing to start. ForwardThis has no app to open and nothing to install. You forward one email with instructions and the errand gets run: the bill entered, the PDF filed, the payment reminder set. If the inbox itself is the mess, Spark tidies it for free and does it on every device you own. If the mess is what each email asks of you afterwards, forward it and let that part happen elsewhere.
ForwardThis and Spark Mail, side by side
What it is
Devices
Accounts
What the AI does
Teamwork
Free plan
Paid from
Apps
What reaches it
Spark Mail pricing and limits checked 5 September 2026.
Which one fits how you work?
Choose Spark Mail if
You want a better inbox on every device you own, a Windows PC and an Android phone included, with one subscription covering all of them.
Budget matters and the free plan has to be real. Spark's is: Smart Inbox, unlimited accounts and calendar at no cost, and the paid tier sits well below the other AI mail apps.
Your mail is not on Google or Microsoft. Spark takes iCloud, Exchange, Yahoo and plain IMAP, which several of the newer AI mail apps will not.
You want threads summarised and meetings transcribed inside the app you already read mail in, rather than in yet another tool.
Unknown senders are the problem. Gatekeeper screens them before they reach you, which is triage ForwardThis never sees, because nothing reaches it unless you forward it.
Choose ForwardThis if
A tidier inbox does not file the invoice. ForwardThis takes the bill into your accounts package, the PDF into cloud storage and the reminder into your task list, from one forwarded email.
You would rather nothing held your mailbox. Spark connects to your accounts because a mail app has to. ForwardThis sees only what you forward, and deletes it once the job is done.
The tools you need are business ones. Spark reaches Reminders, Todoist, Notion and HubSpot; ForwardThis reaches 145+ business apps.
You want work checked before it happens. Anything that puts words in front of other people is quoted in full first, and reversible work can be undone for 24 hours.
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.
Halvorsen Timber
Invoice 8841, September delivery
invoice-8841.pdf
Your instructions
Enter this as a bill in Xero for £1,240, save the PDF with the other supplier invoices, and remind me to pay it on Friday.
Xero
Draft a bill for £1,240
Bills to pay / Draft
Dropbox
File invoice-8841.pdf
Suppliers / Halvorsen Timber
Todoist
Add a task to pay invoice 8841
Finance project, due Friday
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 Spark Mail alternative?
- No. Spark is the app you read mail in, and ForwardThis has no reading surface at all, so swapping one for the other would leave you without an inbox. It is an alternative for what the email asks of you next: the bill entered, the file saved, the task set, in the tools where that work actually belongs.
- Can both be used together?
- Yes, and the pair costs very little. Read and triage in Spark, then forward the handful of emails that create real work. Forwarding is the entire integration, so there is nothing to connect, authorise or configure between the two.
- How does the pricing compare?
- Spark charges per person: free to start, then $10 a user a month, or $8.25 billed annually, with a Pro tier at $20 that adds unlimited meeting notes, read statuses and HubSpot. ForwardThis charges per action for the account rather than per person: 10 actions a month free with every feature, then $15 a month for 100. One forwarded email is one action, however many separate things it asks for.
- Does ForwardThis work on my phone?
- There is nothing to install, on a phone or anywhere else. Forwarding is the interface, so it works from the mail app already on the device, Spark included, and the confirmation comes back as an email, which is where you already are.
- Spark has an AI assistant. Why forward anything?
- Spark's assistant works on the contents of your mailbox: finding, summarising, drafting, transcribing a meeting. It is good at that and ForwardThis does none of it. Spark also connects to a short list of tools, mostly notes and tasks, with HubSpot on the Pro tier. ForwardThis works the other way, outside the mailbox, in the business tools where the follow-up has to land.
- What happens to the email afterwards?
- It is deleted. ForwardThis holds the message briefly so that undo can work, then removes it. No email content is kept long term, whichever mail app it came from.