There are plenty of web-based email service providers that you can resort to, but using an email account with your own domain name will give you more credibility if you have a business, for example, not to mention that with web-based services there are restrictions on the maximum size of the attachments that you can send or receive. In case you use an email service that offers support for the POP3 and IMAP email delivery protocols, you will not bump into such problems and you will be able to use any software program on your personal computer to check your email accounts, including Outlook, Thunderbird or Apple Mail. You can even set up a mailbox on your mobile device. The difference between the two email protocols is that with IMAP, an email message is displayed locally at your end, but remains on the email server, whereas with POP3, the message is downloaded to your computer, unless you set up the program in such a way as to leave a copy on the server.