Almost everyone has at least one e-mail account these days. Simply put, an e-mail address may be required even to register for a social media application or a website. The basic idea of e-mail, which is used more frequently in such works and has an important place in our lives, is to send the messages of the sender to the receiver, as in instant message applications.
Even though e-mail technology is based on the same idea as instant message technology, how is it that mails are delivered later than instant messages? Have you ever thought about this before? Let’s look at the reason why e-mail messages are delivered later than instant messages.
First, it is necessary to understand the working logic of e-mail, which is similar to leaving a letter at the post office.
When you try to send your e-mail to someone, there is a lot of technical processing going on behind the scenes before the e-mail reaches the recipient. If we briefly touch on these processes; When you press the “send e-mail” button, Gmail, Outlook or any e-mail client you use first connects to the outgoing server. The outgoing server verifies the sender’s information and places the message in the outgoing queue for sending. When the connection is established, a message is sent to the other party’s server. To explain this situation with a simple example, we can compare it to going to the post office and leaving a letter or going to the courier branch and dropping the cargo.
In the continuation of the process, when the e-mail reaches the receiving server, the receiving server checks the e-mail address, checks for spam and viruses (These checks vary according to the e-mail client.) and leaves it in the recipient’s inbox. When the recipient refreshes their mailbox, the client checks for anything new and leaves the message in the recipient’s email inbox.
We looked at the working logic of e-mail, but let’s not look at the logic of the instant message, shall we?
The difference of instant messaging from other types of communication is that it has a real-time nature. Today, providing instant messaging; There are dozens of messaging apps that users can use according to their preferences, such as WhatsApp, Telegram, BIP and even Twitter’s DM feature. These messaging apps allow millions of people from all over the world to communicate with each other every day.
When you use a messaging application, there is a direct connection between you and the other person, as if you were looking at them face to face. The central server of the application determines who is online, forwards the IP address of everyone online to your machine. In this way, when you send a message to someone, the central server directly connects you to the recipient’s machine and then provides the opportunity to send a message in real time. That’s why being “online” has its pros and cons.
Instant messaging applications work fast because the sender and receiver use the same application, and the speed difference compared to e-mails starts here because they are processed on the same server.
So where does this speed difference come from? Let’s combine some more basics.
The main reason why emails take minutes or even hours to reach the recipient is that they are designed to work with a range of servers. Unlike instant messages, emails have to circulate between several locations before they land in the recipient’s inbox. It works on the e-mail store and forward model, messages are stored on the server until they are delivered to the recipient.
E-mail operation also has the advantage of server backups, that is, if a server crashes during the message, the message is sent to the backup server. If the e-mail is not delivered, the servers make several more attempts to send the message. So the e-mail system was never designed to send instant messages. Still, today’s e-mail infrastructures have experienced massive advances in exchanging messages, but despite these advances, delays still occur.
Instant messaging services, on the other hand, are designed to be real-time, so if the sender’s message isn’t delivered to the receiver, he forgets it and moves on. Instant messaging programs do not bother to resend the message, unlike e-mail services. That’s why emails aren’t always as fast as instant messages.
Sources: Zoho, Science ABC, Ask Leo
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