What is the name of the protocol used to send email over the internet?

When you compose and dispatch an email, a specific set of digital rules orchestrates its journey across the internet. This fundamental communication standard, known as the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, is exclusively responsible for sending your messages from one server to another. It's the engine behind the scenes that ensures your email leaves your outbox and begins its path to the recipient.

SMTP functions much like a digital postman, handling the initial pickup and subsequent relay of mail. When you click send, your email client uses SMTP to connect to your outgoing mail server. This server then employs SMTP again to communicate with the recipient's mail server, effectively passing the message along until it arrives at its destination. Without this standardized protocol, different email systems would be unable to understand each other, making global email communication impossible.

First defined in the early 1980s, SMTP is one of the internet's oldest and most enduring protocols. Its simplicity and efficiency have allowed it to remain the backbone of email transmission for decades, adapting to the vast expansion of the internet. While other protocols manage how you retrieve emails from your inbox, SMTP's dedicated role in the sending process highlights its critical importance in our daily digital interactions, silently ensuring that billions of messages reach their intended recipients every day.