Proton Mail Review
Encrypted email from a Swiss privacy company, with VPN, storage, and a password manager bundled in on the higher tiers
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Looking for a Proton Mail alternative? See our ranked comparison.→What is Proton Mail?
Proton Mail is an end-to-end encrypted email service from Proton AG, a Swiss company founded by scientists who met at CERN. The entry paid tier, Mail Plus, mostly adds mail capacity: more storage, a custom domain, and aliases, while keeping the same limited VPN (1 connection, 10 countries) and Pass (2 vaults) as the free plan. Proton Unlimited and the household plans above it unlock the full VPN, a fully-featured Pass password manager, and the Scribe writing assistant, so paying for the whole suite really starts at Unlimited, not at Mail Plus.
Messages between Proton Mail users are encrypted end to end. Mail sent to non-Proton addresses can be protected with a password instead. Subject lines and metadata like sender, recipient, and timestamps are not encrypted, since that's a limit of the OpenPGP standard Proton uses, not a bug specific to Proton.
The free plan is genuinely usable long-term, not just a trial: one address, 1 GB of mail storage plus up to 5 GB of separate Drive storage, and a 150-message daily cap. Paid plans remove that cap and add storage, extra addresses, custom domains, and aliases.
Proton Mail screenshots
Who it's for
- ✓ Privacy-focused individuals who want encrypted email without configuring anything themselves
- ✓ People who already want a full VPN, password manager, and cloud storage and would rather pay once for a bundle on the Unlimited plan and up
- ✓ Small teams and founders setting up a custom-domain inbox who don't need deep third-party integrations
Who should look elsewhere
- ✗ Teams that live inside Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 and need tight calendar, docs, and admin integration
- ✗ Anyone expecting the entry Mail Plus tier to include full VPN or Pass access, since both stay at free-plan limits until Unlimited
- ✗ Users who need unencrypted metadata search across huge archives the way Gmail's server-side search handles it
Pros
- + Free plan is usable indefinitely, not a time-limited trial
- + Unlimited and the household plans above it bundle full VPN, Drive storage, Pass password manager, and calendar for one price
- + Open-source apps and a Swiss legal jurisdiction outside US and EU data-sharing agreements
- + Custom domain support starts on the entry Mail Plus tier, not just on business plans
Cons
- – Subject lines and message metadata (sender, recipient, timestamps) are not encrypted
- – Monthly billing costs noticeably more than annual billing on every paid tier
- – Free-tier users report slow or no reply from support, since paid accounts are prioritized
- – Mail Plus, the cheapest paid tier, keeps the same capped VPN and 2-vault Pass as the free plan; full VPN and Pass require upgrading to Unlimited
Proton Mail pricing
What you pay for
Proton Mail is free with 1 GB of storage and one address, and paid plans start at under 4 euros a month if you pay annually. The entry Mail Plus tier mostly buys more mail: storage, a custom domain, and aliases, plus the same limited VPN and password-manager access as the free plan. Full VPN and a fully-featured Pass password manager only arrive on Proton Unlimited and up, which is when paying for mail starts to buy the whole suite. Pricing is public and published on Proton's site. The catch is that billing monthly instead of annually costs noticeably more, and Proton has raised the monthly rate before.
At about $3.99/month to start, it sits mid-pack on price in Email Providers.
| Plan | Price | Highlights |
|---|---|---|
| Proton Free | Free | 1 GB Mail storage plus up to 5 GB separate Drive storage · 1 email address · 150 messages a day · 3 personal calendars · 1 VPN connection in 10 countries |
| Mail Plus | $3.99/seat/mo | 15 GB storage shared with Drive · 10 email addresses, 1 custom domain · 10 hide-my-email aliases · Priority support · Dark Web Monitoring |
| Proton Unlimited | $9.99/seat/mo | 500 GB storage · 15 email addresses, 3 custom domains · Full VPN (10 connections, 120+ countries) · Password manager with 50 vaults · Dark Web Monitoring and Proton Sentinel account protection |
| Proton Duo | $14.99/seat/mo | 2 TB storage shared between 2 people · 30 email addresses, 3 custom domains · Proton Scribe writing assistant · Dark Web Monitoring and Sentinel protection |
| Proton Family | $23.99/seat/mo | 3 TB storage shared between up to 6 people · 90 email addresses, 3 custom domains · Proton Scribe, Dark Web Monitoring, and Sentinel for every member |
| Proton Visionary | $29.99/seat/mo | 6 TB storage shared between up to 6 people · 100 email addresses, 10 custom domains · Proton Lumo Plus with unlimited projects · Proton Meet Professional, up to 100 participants and 24-hour calls |
Prices are from Proton's own plans page, shown in EUR (the currency Proton served at check time), billed annually and shown as a monthly rate. Billing monthly instead of annually costs more per month: Mail Plus is €4.99/mo monthly vs €3.99/mo annual, Unlimited is €12.99/mo monthly vs €9.99/mo annual, Duo is €19.99/mo monthly vs €14.99/mo annual, Family is €29.99/mo monthly vs €23.99/mo annual, and Visionary is €39.99/mo monthly vs €29.99/mo annual. Proton also sells separate business plans (Mail Essentials, Workspace Standard, Workspace Premium) with per-user pricing, but the business pricing page did not render its numbers on this check, so they are left out here. Proton raised its monthly (non-annual) Unlimited price from $11.99 to $12.99 in 2023, while leaving annual subscribers untouched. No further monthly-price increase is documented since then.
Pricing verified July 16, 2026 · source
How Proton Mail's pricing compares
Proton Mail next to its closest alternatives on entry price, billing, and whether pricing is public.
| Tool | Starting price | Billing | Free option | Pricing disclosed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Proton Mail | EUR 3.99/seat/mo | tiered | Yes | Public |
| Gmail | $7/seat/mo | freemium (personal) / per-seat (Google Workspace for business) | Yes | Partly public |
| Fastmail | $3/seat/mo | per-seat | Trial (30 days, no credit card required) | Public |
| Zoho Mail | $1/seat/mo | per-seat | Yes | Partly public |
| Microsoft Outlook | $5.4/seat/mo | tiered | Yes | Public |
| Tuta | EUR 3/mo | tiered | Yes | Public |
| HEY | $99/yr | flat | Trial (30 days on HEY for You, no credit card required) | Public |
Is Proton Mail still actively developed?
Last significant update: June 2026. Easy Switch now helps businesses migrate off Gmail, moving email, contacts, and calendar data into Proton Mail.
Top Proton Mail alternatives
Proton Mail FAQ
Is Proton Mail actually free, or just a trial?+
The free plan has no time limit. You get one address, 1 GB of storage, and a 150-message daily cap for as long as you use it.
Does Proton Mail encrypt everything, including subject lines?+
No. Message bodies are end-to-end encrypted, but subject lines and metadata like sender, recipient, and timestamps are not, because of a limit in the OpenPGP standard Proton relies on.
Is it cheaper to pay monthly or annually?+
Annually. Mail Plus is €3.99/mo billed annually versus €4.99/mo billed monthly, and Unlimited is €9.99/mo billed annually versus €12.99/mo billed monthly.
Can I use my own domain on a cheap plan?+
Yes. Mail Plus, the entry paid tier, includes one custom domain. Unlimited raises that to three.