About PocketInbox

PocketInbox is a privacy-first aggregator over the best free disposable-email providers on the open web. We don't run a mail server. We didn't invent disposable email. What we did do is take the providers worth using, hide their differences behind one interface, and ship it inside an iPhone-grade UI so you don't have to think about which one to pick.

Why we built it

Email-based gatekeeping is everywhere. Tap a "free trial" link, hit a paywall, download a whitepaper — and your inbox pays the price for years. Disposable email is the obvious answer, but the existing options are either deliberately ugly, deliberately spammy, or quietly broken (most of the early-2010s services have been shut down or sold to ad networks). We wanted a clean, fast, honest place where the only thing on the page is the inbox you generated.

How it works

• Generate. Tap "Generate" on the home screen. We pick a healthy upstream provider (or use the one you choose), make a server-to-server call where required, and hand you back the address.
• Receive. When the upstream provider supports real-time delivery (Mail.tm and Mail.gw via Mercure SSE), new mail surfaces within ~3 seconds. Everywhere else, we poll every 5–10 seconds. A polling backstop runs alongside SSE/WS so a flaky network connection doesn't lose mail.
• Read. HTML bodies are sanitised with DOMPurify and rendered in a sandboxed iframe with no script execution. Tracking pixels still load (we don't proxy images by default), but cross-site script attempts are stripped.
• Forget. Burning an inbox calls the provider's delete endpoint where supported (Mail.tm DELETE /accounts/{id}, Guerrilla's forget_me). Where the upstream API doesn't support deletion, we forget it locally and let the provider's natural retention expire it.

Providers we use

We currently aggregate 5 backends. Each is implemented behind a single MailProvider TypeScript interface so we can swap, weight, or fail over in code without surprising the UI:

• Mail.tm — Stable, free since 2018. CORS + real-time SSE.
• Mail.gw — Mirror of mail.tm, separate IP/domain pool.
• Guerrilla Mail — No-friction. Custom local-part. ~1h address.
• Maildrop — Open-source catch-all GraphQL inbox @maildrop.cc.
• TempMail.lol — Free, modern REST. Inbox lasts ~1 hour.

We also support "bring your own key" providers (Mailsac, TempMail.Plus, RapidAPI temp-mail.org) for power users who want privacy under their own account, plus aliasing services (addy.io, SimpleLogin) for those who want forwarding to a real inbox.

How we stay free

We use Google AdSense to keep the lights on. Ads are only loaded after you accept the advertising category in our cookie banner. We never put ads inside the message reader and we never sell the inbox addresses you generate. If you'd like to support PocketInbox without ads, click "Cookie Preferences" → reject "Advertising," then tell a friend who needs a temp inbox.

Who built this

PocketInbox is a small independent project. Source-available components live on GitHub. If you build something using PocketInbox, drop us a line via the contact page — we love seeing it.

Press, partnerships, journalists

We're happy to talk to journalists, bloggers, and security researchers about temp-mail, email-privacy hygiene, and how to spot phishing. Email hello@pocketinbox.app with "Press" in the subject line and we'll get back within a couple of days.