Is Ymail a Valid Email? All Questions Answered
Izabela is a leading contributor to the Bouncer’s blog. She is inspired to help companies all around the world to get emails into their recipients’ inboxes
Cybersecurity experts tell us regularly that we should look closely at the email addresses from which we get any messages.
If the address looks unusual or unfamiliar to us and the message sounds suspicious as well, then we should delete the mail as it might be a phishing attack. But there are also a few domains that are regularly taken for spammy ones, while they are, in fact, a perfectly valid domain – such as Ymail.
Why? Let’s take a closer look at Ymail addresses and what makes them look so suspicious to online users – and what you should do when you see such an email domain on your own email list.
What is Ymail?
It might sometimes look like the only email service provider we have nowadays is Gmail since most of the personal email addresses we see end in “gmail.com.” However, there are many other email providers that are not so common.
Google Mail holds 28% of the email client market share with 1.8 billion users, so no wonder we are seeing it so often. Online users have far more choices nowadays when it comes to creating an email account though – Outlook, AOL, Proton, and also Yahoo search providers all have their email service available as well.
But while virtually all online users can recognize “outlook.com” or “yahoo.com” domains, not many people know who the “ymail.com” domain belongs to. And so many of them might suspect that the emails might come from spammy web pages or that they might be a mistyped Gmail address.
The answer is very simple though – Ymail was one of the optional domains Yahoo Mail users could pick when signing up for the Yahoo mail service.
In short, Ymail is a valid email domain. And while it is not a popular email service and not an email suffix you see often, it’s perfectly fine to send emails to these addresses.
Is Ymail the same as Yahoo Mail?
If Ymail was hosted by the Yahoo Mail web portal, does it mean that a Ymail and Yahoo mail account are one and the same thing? Pretty much yes – Ymail addresses were essentially Yahoo Mail email addresses with a different mail domain.
Yahoo wanted to give email users more email address options to pick from, so they added the Ymail domain to the list of available suffixes. Whichever suffix their user picked, they had the same mail interface, features, and storage size available to them. So there’s basically no difference between an address ending in yahoo.com and the one ending in ymail.com.
It’s fine for your email security to send out emails to these addresses. It’s a decent email service and while it lacks the suite of tools that its competitors have (Google Drive, Google Docs, Google Photos, Google Calendar and other Google Workspace tools), it’s still a reputable email domain.
Is Ymail a valid email?
Yahoo Mail no longer allows users to pick the ymail.com extension for their accounts – the only domain option you can choose now is yahoo.com.
However, many older addresses still use the ymail.com domain, and Yahoo Mail treats it as a valid email address. So if you see an email with the extension ymail.com, there’s a good chance that it’s simply an email account that was created some years ago when this extension was available.
Can I send emails to Ymail addresses?
The last question you probably have here is whether you can send emails to Ymail addresses. While Yahoo no longer allows creating those, the existing Ymail addresses work exactly the same way as any other email address, so yes, you absolutely can send emails to those accounts.
To stay on the safe side though, you should validate all Ymail, and Yahoo Mail addresses you want to send emails to the same way you would verify all other email addresses. If you want to use secure email services and provide an amazing email experience, should still validate all the emails on your list.
Since Yahoo Mail is unfortunately quite infamous for the number of bounced emails and their pretty outdated spam filters, checking whether the Yahoo emails on your list are still active can help you reduce the number of bounced emails. Some of the inactive Ymail accounts might also be now used as spam traps – so by cleaning your list regularly, you can avoid accidentally hitting one (and damaging your sender reputation).
Bouncer can help you verify Ymail accounts
A clever way to quickly and efficiently verify the email addresses on your list (from all email service providers) is to use Bouncer for the task. Bouncer will check the emails for:
- Typos
- Inactivity
- Bounce rates
- Signs of toxicity (such as being a potential spam trap address)
and then highlight all emails you should remove from the list on their dashboard. One click and you’ll get a fresh list with only genuine and active emails on it which you can use straight away.
Want to see Bouncer in action? Try out the free 14-day trial – or you can verify your first 5 (100 if you signup) email addresses entirely for free.
So… Is Ymail a valid email? We’ve got the answer
Seeing an email address ending in a Ymail extension might raise doubts – especially if it’s the first time you see the suffix. Is it just a mistyped Gmail domain?
No, Yahoo Mail is a perfectly valid email service millions of people still use for sending and receiving email messages. And while Yahoo no longer allows new accounts to use the extension, there are still hundreds of thousands of accounts that have an email address with the extension.
So, the next time you encounter a Ymail address, remember that it is a genuine email service – though for extra security, you can always verify it via Bouncer 🙂
Frequently asked questions
What is Ymail?
Ymail was an optional extension users could choose while creating a Yahoo account. To help users pick their desired email addresses, Yahoo (an American web services provider) gave users an option to either use the standard yahoo.com domain or ymail.com domain for their web-based Yahoo mail accounts.
It has a basic email app that allowed you to create a business email in the past, but no more. Speaking of which…
Can you still create a Ymail account?
No. Yahoo Mail no longer allows users to pick the Ymail extension for their new email account. However, many older accounts that were created while Yahoo offered the option still use the addresses ending with Ymail – so you should treat them as any other Yahoo address.
Are people still using Yahoo Mail?
Yes – Yahoo has approximately 225 million active users, giving it a 3% market share. While this might not look impressive compared to Gmail and its 1.8 billion active users, Yahoo Mail is the fourth most often used email service in the world. The service is most popular with Gen X and Baby Boomers – 32% of Yahoo Mail users are from ages 45 to 54 years.
They value an efficient email experience that Yahoo provides over signing up for Gmail, despite its extra email features.
How does Yahoo Mail compare to other email service providers?
Yahoo’s functionality is unfortunately slightly outdated – it only has a few basic features available for email account users. The service is also regularly targeted in cyberattacks as its security features are very limited – so users fearing data breaches or losing access to their accounts prefer to use other services, like Gmail.
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