Make Mailr your email app¶

An email link (a mailto: link) is a link that starts an email: "Write to us" on a website, an address in a PDF, "Send by email" in another program. In Mailr such a link opens a draft in Mailr's own composer, with the recipients, the subject and the text filled in. Browsers and computers can be set to do the same for email links everywhere else. Nothing is sent by a link; the draft is sent only with Send.

A link fills at most 50 recipients (To, Cc and Bcc together) and 50,000 characters of text. Each recipient shows its name; point at it, or move to its × with the keyboard, to see the address.

Email links inside Mailr¶

These open a draft in Mailr, in the current style:

an email link in a message you read;
an address in an answer from Ambrose;
the address on a person's card (Settings → Mail → People & groups, or a card opened from Ambrose);
Email it in the invite dialog (Settings → Admin → Users → Invite someone): the draft is addressed to the person you invited and holds the link and its last day.

Hold Ctrl (or ⌘ on a Mac) while you click an email link to leave it to your browser instead.

Compose links¶

Any link of this form opens a draft in Mailr, on your own server's address:

https://mail.example.com/compose?to=dana@example.com&cc=sam@example.com&subject=Plans&body=Hello
https://mail.example.com/compose?mailto=mailto%3Adana%40example.com%3Fsubject%3DPlans

to, cc and bcc take one address or several, separated by commas. Names may be included: "Dana Lee" <dana@example.com>.
subject and body are the subject and the text. Write a line break as %0A.
mailto takes a whole email link. Other email programs and the browser use this form.

When you are signed out, the sign-in page comes first, and the draft opens after you sign in.

Browsers¶

Settings → Mail → Writing → Email links in Chrome

In Chrome, Edge, Brave, Opera, Vivaldi and Firefox on a computer, Mailr can open the email links of every website:

Open Settings → Mail → Writing and go to Email links.
Click Use Mailr for email links.
Confirm in your browser. Chrome and Edge show an icon at the right end of the address bar; Firefox shows a bar at the top of the page.
Click Try an email link to check. A browser does not tell a website whether you confirmed, so the setting cannot show it.

To stop, choose another app for email links: in Chrome and Edge under Settings → Privacy and security → Site settings → Additional permissions → Protocol handlers, in Firefox under Settings → General → Applications → mailto.

The installed Mailr app (in Chrome or Edge, see The web app on your phone) can also be set as the email app. The browser asks the first time an email link opens with it.

Safari cannot send email links to a website, on a Mac, an iPhone or an iPad. Email links says so when you open it there. On a Mac, use Chrome, Edge or Firefox for this.

Linux desktops¶

After these steps, email links in every program open a draft in Mailr in the default browser: links in PDFs, "Send by email" in a file manager, links in other browsers.

Save this helper as ~/.local/bin/mailr-compose, with your server's address in place of https://mail.example.com, and make it executable (chmod +x ~/.local/bin/mailr-compose):
```
#!/bin/sh
exec xdg-open "https://mail.example.com/compose?mailto=${1:-}"
```

Save this as ~/.local/share/applications/mailr-compose.desktop, with your home folder in the Exec line:

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=Mailr
GenericName=Email
Exec=/home/you/.local/bin/mailr-compose %u
Icon=mail-message-new
Terminal=false
Categories=Network;Email;
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/mailto;

Make it the default for email links:

xdg-mime default mailr-compose.desktop x-scheme-handler/mailto

On KDE Plasma, also open System Settings → Default Applications and choose Mailr under Email client. On GNOME, Settings → Apps → Default apps → Mail shows it too.
Test it: xdg-open 'mailto:someone@example.com?subject=Hello'.

With a copy of Mailr's source, run tools/desktop/install-mailto-handler.sh https://mail.example.com to do steps 1 and 2.

Windows and macOS¶

Use the browser handler above, in Chrome, Edge or Firefox, and make that browser your default browser. Windows and macOS then send email links to the browser's choice. On Windows, if email links still open another program, open Settings → Apps → Default apps, search for MAILTO and choose your browser.

Android¶

In the Mailr app, email links open the app's composer with the recipients, Cc, Bcc, subject and text filled in. To make Mailr your phone's email app, open the phone's Settings → Apps → Default apps (the name differs between phones) and choose Mailr for email. Or tap an email link once and choose Mailr with Always. See Mail on the phone.